Chapter 30: Obtaining the Heavenly Recommendation and Collection

  "Out!" Li Wenjun held the whistle rod and walked to the side of the horse carriage, saying sternly. His tongue was pressing against a wild walnut under his tongue, and his voice was very muffled.

  There was no movement inside the carriage, and it was unclear whether Kong Yaoshi had fainted or was just holding onto a glimmer of hope.

  "If you don't come out, I'll burn the horse carriage with one torch." Li Wenjun said fiercely.

  He was seriously injured and had lost so much blood, he was now barely holding on. If his spirit relaxed even a little, he would pass out and never get up again.

  He no longer had the energy to drill into the carriage and compete with Kong Yao Shi for the wild mountain spirit. Moreover, Kong Yao Shi was a big living person, still a pharmacist, perhaps he didn't count as strong and healthy, but in the carriage, suddenly taking action, against Li Wen Jun at this time, it was still very advantageous.

  "Don't burn, don't burn, I'm coming out right away." Kong Yaoshi was also a coward, and when he heard Li Wenjun wanted to burn the carriage, he didn't dare continue to confront him either. He quickly and obediently crawled out of the carriage.

  "Give me the Wild Mountain Essence quickly. Don't test my patience." Li Wenjun said harshly.

  Kong the medicine master saw Li Wenjun shaking and about to collapse, almost becoming a blood person. He knew that as long as he persisted for a while, he could win without a fight. His eyes rolled around and he said: "Good fellow, the mountain spirit is in the horse carriage, I'll get it for you."

  With a turn of his body, Kong Yaoshi slipped back into the carriage and this time he refused to come out no matter what.

  Li Wenjun urged twice, seeing that Kong Yaoshi was unwilling to come out, he knew something was wrong. He picked up the wooden sword that Li had thrown to the ground and cut down the lantern on the horse carriage, directly throwing it onto the carriage. "If you don't come out, then go die."

  "Good fellow, don't burn it, I'm coming out, I'll come out right away!" Kong Yaoshi hastily got out of the carriage, holding a red box.

  "Give me the Wild Mountain Essence." Li Wenjun stretched out his hand, which was wearing a glove that had also been soaked with blood and was now bright red, a sight that made one's hair stand on end.

  Kong the medicine master didn't dare to play any more tricks, and hastily handed over the box in his arms to Li Wenjun. He said: "Good fellow, what's inside is the Wild Mountain Spirit. Please take it quickly and go, I beg of you not to kill me."

  According to Kong's intention, Li Wenjun had already struggled to this point, and once he got what he wanted, he would definitely leave immediately. However, what he didn't expect was that Li Wenjun didn't follow his plan and leave right away. Instead, he opened the rope on the red box, put it on the ground, walked a few steps aside, grabbed the whistle rod, and poked the red box open from a distance.

  Kong's face turned white in an instant. When he was hiding in the carriage compartment earlier, he had tampered with the red box, taking out the wild mountain essence and replacing it with something else. He thought this would deceive Li Wenjun, but unexpectedly Li Wenjun was so cautious.

  Li Wenjun opened the red box and saw that there was nothing like hidden weapons or poisonous smoke coming out, so he walked over with a peace of mind. He picked up the red box and took a look inside, where it was actually just a rotten piece of wood.

  Li Wenjun angrily flung the red box away, and with a dagger stained with Li Tou's blood pointed at Kong Yao Shi, he said viciously: "You dare to deceive me?"

  "Good sir, spare my life!" Kong Yaoshi no longer dared to play any tricks. He hastily took out a small package wrapped in red cloth from his bosom and handed it over to Li Wenjun, "This is the wild mountain essence that I had hidden away."

  Li Wenjun took the red cloth package in his hand, opened it and looked inside. It was indeed the same piece of wild mountain incense he had seen at Zhang Qi's house before. The shape, size, color, and fragrance were all exactly the same, without any difference.

  Li Wenjun was overjoyed to have captured the Wild Mountain Essence, and he glanced at Kong Yao Shi, hesitating whether to take advantage of the situation and kill him. Just then, his vision went black, and his foot slipped, almost causing him to fall to the ground.

  Li Wenjun secretly thought that things were not going well, he was about to collapse, and if Kong Yaoshi circled around him a little more, not only would he be unable to kill Kong Yaoshi, but he would also fall to the ground, and at that time, his life and death would be in Kong Yaoshi's hands.

  He didn't even bother to go kill Kong Yao Shi anymore, but instead stumbled and staggered to the front of the horse, stepped on the stirrup with one foot, flipped onto the horseback, pulled the reins, kicked the horse with his heel, and galloped away in a cloud of smoke.

  Kong Yao Shi gazed at Li Wen Jun's back, stamping his foot repeatedly. He truly regretted it - earlier, how could he have forgotten to put some medicine on the Wild Mountain Spirit? This way, he would have been able to directly knock Li Wen Jun unconscious and absolutely wouldn't have let him snatch the Wild Mountain Spirit away.

  Li Wenjun rode his horse, and after fleeing for more than half a time, the escaped yamen runner brought people back to rescue him. He didn't run back to the county seat of Sanshan County, but ran back to the mule shop, using the wooden knife in his hand and his official identity, with a mix of intimidation and threats, he managed to pull over a dozen people.

  "Kong Yao Shi, where is that thief?" asked the constable, sitting on his horseback.

  "He's long gone. Hurry up and chase after him along the road, he was almost exhausted when he ran away just now. Look at the road where he ran, it's all bloody, as long as you follow the blood, you'll definitely catch up." Kong Yao Shi said. "You must catch up with him, he snatched the wild mountain spirit away."

  "What? He's stolen the Wild Mountain Essence from me?! Mother...! You're all listening, follow me to chase after him. If we catch up, there'll be a reward. If we don't, I'll tell Master and have you all arrested for highway robbery!"

  The constable shouted at the crowd, then urged his horse to chase after Li Wenjun. After rushing back to the mule and horse shop, he changed to a healthy horse. If he continued to use the horse that Li Wenjun had fed with croton seeds, he would never be able to catch up with Li Wenjun even if he died trying.

  The constables and others had been tracking very smoothly from the start, and now that it was daylight, the bloodstains on the ground were clearly visible. As long as they followed the bloodstains, they wouldn't have to worry about not catching up with the person.

  They found that the bloodstains did not continue along the official road, but on a small path intersecting with the official road, both the bloodstains and hoof prints disappeared from the official road and turned into the small path.

  The little path was overgrown with weeds and low shrubs, the grass was withered and thorny. The constables galloped along the path in pursuit. But as they chased, they found that the bloodstains on the road became less and less, until finally, there were only hoof prints left, without a single trace of blood to be seen.

  The bloodstains have disappeared. Does this mean that Li Wenjun has already bandaged his wound, or did he abandon his horse halfway and flee?

  The official was somewhat flustered, he couldn't judge what was going on. What he feared most was that Li Wenjun had already bandaged his wound and abandoned his horse halfway, in which case even if he caught up with the horse, he wouldn't be able to catch Li Wenjun, let alone retrieve the lost Wild Mountain Essence.

  Nowadays, the constable is also at a loss for what to do. All he can do is continue to follow the hoof prints and hope that when he catches up, Li Wenjun is still on horseback.

  They chased until almost noon, and the yamen runners who had been riding on horseback were about to fall apart. They finally caught up with the horse that Li Wenjun had ridden before. The horse was standing by the side of the road, lowering its head to eat the dry grass on the ground. There was a wound on its buttocks, and blood was flowing out. But there was no trace of Li Wenjun.

  The bailiff shouted loudly, but there was nothing he could do.

  Li Wenjun fainted on the horse's back after losing a lot of blood and becoming weak, unable to resist.

  After bouncing on horseback for an unknown amount of time, Li Wenjun suddenly woke up. He clearly felt that the wound on his back had disappeared and the blood had stopped flowing.

  The wound healed, and Li Wenjun let out a long sigh of relief. What he was most worried about wasn't that he wouldn't be able to snatch the Wild Mountain Spirit, but rather that this sudden ability to rapidly recover from injuries would suddenly disappear. This time, his injury was unprecedentedly severe, only one step away from death. If he couldn't recover as scheduled, he'd have no choice but to wait for death. In that case, forget about cultivating immortality or living for several hundred years - all of those things would be completely out of reach for him.

  The wound has healed, but his body is still a bit weak due to massive blood loss, which won't recover immediately.

  Li Wenjun didn't know how long he had been running, but judging from the horse's remaining energy and the sun's position in the sky, he knew it was probably just one or two hours. He reined in the horse, stopped it, turned around, got off the horse, stabbed the horse's buttocks with a knife, and let the horse continue to run forward, while he himself ran into a grass nest far away from the road and hid.

  Li Wenjun first took out the red cloth package, looked at the wild mountain spirit with joy, and almost lost his life. This piece of wild mountain spirit, only half the size of a palm, had gone through life and death, and after much trouble, he finally got it in his hands.

  Li Wenjun took a glance and carefully put the wild mountain spirit into his storage bag, then took out some food from the storage bag, including braised meat, roasted flatbread, pickled vegetables, and clear water, and began to eat voraciously.

  After wolfing down the food to fill his stomach, Li Wenjun felt that his weakness wasn't so severe after a short rest. He stood up, found a tree branch, leaned on it and walked towards the distance.

  After walking for a few miles, Li Wenjun was delighted to find a riverbed in front of him with water inside. He quickly ran into the riverbed, picked up some branches and dry grass, lit a fire, took out his spare clothes from his backpack, warmed himself by the fire, then stripped naked in the wilderness, jumped into the riverbed, washed himself clean, and rinsed off all the bloodstains on his body.

  Finding this river ditch, strictly speaking, can't be all Li Wenjun's luck.

  He had seen a map when he was studying at Sanshan College, which showed the topography of Sanshan County and several surrounding counties. This ditch was marked on the map. At that time, Li Wenjun also specially asked Lu Xiaoyu how to view the map, so when he escaped, he didn't take the official road or other small roads, but instead took this small road with a big purpose, which was to find this ditch and wash away the blood stains on his body.

  Of course, there is also a lot of luck in this. Whether there is water in the ditch or not, Li Wenjun did not dare to confirm beforehand. More importantly, the time he fainted on horseback was not something he could control. If he missed it, it was also possible. However, he still had some good luck, and not only was there water in the ditch, but he also luckily didn't miss it.

  Even if it was missed, Li Wenjun had planned a backup plan. His storage package still had some clean water, which could be simply cleaned up, and the remaining bloodstains could be dealt with in another way.