Wishes in This Life (Part 2)

  Yan Bing saw Liu Zhi's confusion and basically determined that Liu Zhi shouldn't be a member of the Mystic Sect, just a martial artist. He explained: "This knife is made from alloy steel casting and forging, with talismans on its surface, which are carved using laser technology. Then, cinnabar is deposited onto the talismans through gas phase deposition, and after being placed in a spiritual hole for some time, it becomes extremely sharp, having a strong restraining effect on evil spirits and ghosts!"

  "Is it like the production of chips?" Liu Zhi knew modern science very well and immediately understood the origin of this craftsmanship. He was not convinced in his heart, from the knowledge he had mastered about the practice of talismans, that although this method had some effect, it was far from the true meaning of talismans, and the properties of the materials could not be activated. Laser engraving and printing talismans did not have any real spiritual power inside, almost no effect at all. The only thing that was worth affirming was the use of cinnabar sedimentation in the talismans and nurturing them in the spiritual holes. This industrial method was fundamentally wrong, if one could not gather the spiritual energy of heaven and earth into the talismans, how could there be any effect? And when drawn by hand, especially by a Daoist who had undergone special training to draw talismans, with concentrated spirit, naturally gathering the spiritual power of heaven and earth within.

  Take another look at the special police, who received a batch of bullets with similar symbols drawn on them. Liu Zhi knew that this method had limited effect, but it was hard to withstand the sheer quantity. In modern times, the country's power was indeed terrifying.

  Yan Bing used a short sword and crossbow, Lai Jixue chose a dagger with talismans painted on it, the others were special police, using hot weapons, only the bullets were different from ordinary ones.

  After receiving the weapons, everyone was free to do their own thing, but they were not allowed to leave the reception area. Liu Zhi knew returned to his room, familiarized himself with the knife in his hand, and then lay down on the bed to rest, preparing to set out early the next morning.

  The sun had just risen, and Liu Zhi knew that they had arrived at the valley where the bamboo shoots were found. They entered through a narrow, damp passageway, with occasional light rain falling from above, which was actually water seeping out of the high cliffs. The narrowest part required one to enter sideways, and the passage was uneven in height, with great differences in elevation. Even within ten meters or so, there was a small cave. Everyone had to exert themselves greatly before they could finally enter the valley.

  As soon as they entered the valley, it was an almost closed pan-land, similar to a sky pit. There were two small waterfalls hanging down around it, one facing the crowd and one on the left side.

  Liu Zhi knew that he had a slight response, and he understood why there were red fruits here. This was a place where the earth's veins gathered, and everyone's spirit was refreshed. The air was so fresh, and originally, everyone came from the big mountains, and the air was naturally very good. This place was even better. This was the feeling of those special police officers. For Liu Zhi, this place was simply a blessed land, full of spiritual energy.

  Lai Jixue, being a geomancer by trade, immediately saw the subtlety and said to Liu Zhi: "It's amazing that there is such a good place. I really want to build a house here. Cultivating in this place is much better than other places! Younger brother, what are your wishes? How about building a hut here?"

  "My wish is simple, to live freely and without worries, with just enough money to get by!" Liu Zhi's heart skipped a beat, he had never really thought about it before. Although his teachers used to talk about ideals in school, those words were almost empty and hypocritical. After some deep thinking, he spoke these words.

  Yan Bing was examining a palm-sized electronic device that Liu Zhi Zhu had seen before, which was obviously a combination of positioning and information transmission. In this valley, mobile phones had no signal, after all, there were mountains all around, but Yan Bing nodded in satisfaction, the signal was poor, but it could be used. Putting away the device, he overheard Liu Zhi Zhu and Lai Ji Xue's conversation, his heart moved: "This place doesn't belong to you, our department discovered it first, we plan to build a base here, you can stay if you want, but you have to join us!"

  Lai Jixue's face turned red with anger: "Yan Xiaojie, this is a lawless land, you're being too overbearing!"

  "This is where our people almost lost their lives before discovering it. Besides, all the land belongs to the country, how can it be considered ownerless territory?" Yan Bing said unequivocally.

  "You're ruthless! Where's Zhu Guo?" Lai Jixue changed the subject.

  "Not far ahead, about 500 meters away. Everyone be careful, the mountain goblins move too quickly. If you see a mountain goblin, kill it immediately!" Yan Bing gave the order.

  Everyone became tense, Liu Zhi's senses were all activated, and there was no road in the valley at all. Fortunately, the two had been here before, and there were still some faint marks left. The special police carefully held their guns with bullets loaded, and they moved cautiously towards the inside, surrounding Bing and others in the middle.

  Liu Zhi's perception has increased by a lot compared to before, reaching around 30 meters. It is completely a passive reception state, not the kind of spiritual awareness scanning outside. To be honest, Liu Zhi only saw this in books and found that he couldn't do it himself, whether it was because his skills were too low or if there was an error. However, currently, this state also has its advantages - it won't disturb others. Yan Bing is clearly not an ordinary person, and Lai Ji Xue is also a master of the craft. Liu Zhi's state just happens to not disturb them.

  Within a range of thirty meters, every single movement was reflected in Liu Zhi's heart, even the slightest rustling of leaves caused by the wind was clearly perceived by Liu Zhi's consciousness. Before he could take a hundred steps, Liu Zhi suddenly moved and shouted: "Be careful!" A person had already approached a special police officer, with a knife flashing from beside him. A silver-green light had just shot out from behind a tree, but was cut off by Liu Zhi's knife, falling to the ground. Everyone was startled, and when they looked again, it was a snake - a triangular-shaped head, with silver and green rings on its body, clearly a venomous snake. The two halves of the snake's body were writhing on the ground.

  "What kind of snake is this?" Lai Jixue asked, he had never seen it before.

  "This is a bit like the silver ring snake, but it seems to be mutated or a new species, I don't know!" Zhao Yongsheng said uncertainly, familiar with some local conditions.

  "It should be a mutation, the spiritual energy here is abundant, and some biological mutations are normal. Besides, it's winter now, although this place is in the south, most snakes have already hibernated!" Yan Bing looked at the snake still writhing on the ground, stepped on its head with one foot, and spun her foot to crush the snake's head into a pulp. She instructed: "Everyone be careful, there may be some toxic substances here, as the mountain is deep and the forest is dense!"

  Zhao Yongsheng nodded and made a hand gesture. The SWAT team members moved forward in pairs, back to back. One of the SWAT officers smiled at Liu Zhi and expressed gratitude.

  Everyone was on high alert as they moved forward, but it turned out to be winter and they didn't encounter any other poisonous substances. After nearly a minute of walking 500 meters, a small tree with coral-like branches and jade-like leaves appeared in front of them between the rocks. It was only about one person tall, with over a dozen bright red fruits hanging from it, slightly smaller than ping-pong balls. In Liu Zhi's sensory perception, they seemed like small suns, and he knew they were good things, but unfortunately, there wasn't any for him, as he was just playing the role of a mercenary.

  Yan Bing stopped in her tracks, raised her hand, and the crowd stopped, only a dozen or so meters away from Zhu Guo. The crowd was tense, looking around cautiously, knowing that there was a mountain goblin nearby, but all around was quiet, without a single sound.

  Yan Bing made a gesture to Lai Jixue, who understood and took out three yellow crystals. Liu Zhi knew that these were the same instruments that Lai Jixue had used last time against the yin-yang master, the heavy crystal stones that had been refined by Di Shi's spiritual energy. The three crystals formed an equilateral triangle, emitting a faint glow that protected the two of them as they walked towards the jujube tree.

  Others were on high alert, watching all this. To Liu Zhi, it was not surprising that Lai Jixue used this trick, he had seen it once before. The other special police officers were different, and this mythical scene completely shattered their beliefs.

  As soon as the two of them walked under the tree, an object suddenly entered Liu Zhi's sensory range at an extremely fast speed, like a green shadow. Liu Zhi clearly sensed that it was a monkey-like creature with a body covered in green fur, a dark blue face, and two canine teeth slightly exposed. Its fingernails were about 2-3 inches long, black with a hint of green light, and it pounced towards Yan Bing.

  Yan Bing suddenly raised his head, the steel crossbow in his hand lifted, and with a loud crash, an arrow engraved with talismans shot towards Shan Gui like lightning. At the same time, Lai Ji Xue also pointed at the air, and a wave of pale yellow light surged forward, rushing towards Shan Gui like a wave. Shan Gui's claws stretched out fiercely, grabbing at the steel arrow, his fingernails colliding with the arrowhead, the arrow seeming to flash red for an instant before they met, the sound of metal clashing echoing in their ears, sparks flying everywhere, and the yellow light surged forward, instantly sending Shan Gui flying high into the air.

  The SWAT team saw the mountain goblin and pointed their guns at it, firing wildly. The bullets were specially made, emitting a white glow as they left the barrel, with a faint red light visible within. The mountain goblin let out a shrill cry, its claws flailing wildly as sparks flew everywhere. Its fingernails managed to deflect some of the bullets, but there were too many and it still took several hits, splattering dark green liquid from its body. However, this was not enough to be fatal. The creature cried out again and pounced at the SWAT team from mid-air. Everyone quickly turned their guns around, but the mountain goblin was too fast.

  Liu Zhi knew something was wrong, his body twisted and pushed a nearby SWAT officer away. The officer hadn't fully dodged, but the exposed head was caught by Shan Mai on his left arm, blood splattered everywhere, and his left arm immediately drooped down. Liu Zhi's knife light burst out from his waist, directly wrapping around Shan Mai. Shan Mai possibly felt danger, twisted his waist in mid-air, and grabbed towards the knife light with both claws.

  Liu Zhi felt a knife cut through the air, and in the sound of metal clashing, the mountain goblin was sliced by Liu Zhi's knife and flew out, but surprisingly it wasn't cut into two segments. Liu Zhi knew the power of his own knife, back then he could behead a python with one slash, now this knife's power wasn't inferior to that day's, although the knife in his hand couldn't compare to his former Miao Dao, it was still much sharper than ordinary knives, and could be considered as sharp as cutting through metal, and he couldn't help but feel shocked by the mountain goblin's physical strength.

  Liu Zhi didn't know that the mountain goblin's body wasn't as he imagined, but the mountain goblin used its fingernails to scratch. Just now it could even block bullets, and then like this, Liu Zhi cut off three of its fingernails with one knife.

  The mountain goblin was split in mid-air by Liu Zhi's knife, and Yan Bing waved his hand. Many stones on the ground flew up and hit the mountain goblin. Control of objects! Liu Zhi suddenly understood Yan Bing's abilities, and the SWAT team's guns also swept over. Even in this situation, the mountain goblin pressed one of the stones that hit it, its body suddenly rising like a green shadow, and the bullets almost missed.

  At this moment, a white mist rolled towards the mountain demon, and Liu Zhi knew that several meters away, he felt a chill, and couldn't help but look at Yan Bing with a different gaze. Apart from controlling objects, he also had temperature control abilities, it seemed that among special departments, there were also hidden dragons and sleeping tigers.

  The mountain goblin's body suddenly stiffened, and a short sword shot out like lightning, controlled by Yan Bing's ability to manipulate objects. In an instant, it pierced the mountain goblin's body, causing it to fall from the air. Before it could die, it fiercely pulled out the short sword and prepared to pounce on everyone again.

  Liu Zhi's feet grasped the ground, his toes curled under, as he held a knife in front of him like a large spear. He stabbed it into the Shan Gui's chest, but to his surprise, the blade didn't seem to penetrate as easily as he had imagined. His mind was filled with doubt, yet his hands moved swiftly without hesitation. With a swift motion, he withdrew the knife and stepped back, as a dark green liquid spurted out from the wound. The Shan Gui's eyes dimmed, and it finally collapsed to the ground. The crowd still held their guns trained on the creature, not relaxing until after a long while, when they finally let out a sigh of relief.

  Zhao Yongsheng and the SWAT team immediately surrounded the injured SWAT officer from earlier, who had already fainted. Looking at his left arm, it was as if a knife had cut through it, with bones broken and only a piece of skin holding it together.

  The crowd tore off their clothes, tied up the broken arm, and the wound was a bit black. Obviously, the mountain goblin's claws were not clean either. Amidst the crowd's shouting, the special police officer named Wang Yong woke up. Liu Zhi saw this, took out a small porcelain bottle from his body, poured out a pill of ginseng nourishing spirit, and fed it to Wang Yong's mouth. Only then did Wang Yong's spirits improve somewhat.

  Yan Bing saw this, took out a special device like a mobile phone, shouted to the outside, and asked the responding personnel to come quickly. This place has been settled, and there is one injured person.

  After the communication ended, he took out several jade boxes from his backpack behind him. Liu Zhi knew that these jade boxes were used to store Zhu Guo as soon as he saw the symbols drawn on them. The jade box alone couldn't completely preserve the spiritual medicine, but with the help of the symbols, the effect was much better.

  Yan Bing picked the zhū guǒ and put it in a jade box, but Lai Ji Xue found three black fingernails with a hint of green on the ground, each over two inches long. Just as he was about to put them in his waist bag, Yan Bing discovered him and said coldly: "Lai Ji Xue, this is national property, you are not allowed to embezzle it!"

  Lai Jixue scowled and said: "It's just a few fingernails, don't be so petty!"

  "No way!" Yan Bing was unmoved, and Lai Jixue reluctantly handed over: "You're really petty, next time I won't go on a mission with a woman!"

  Liu Zhi realized where his knife had landed, and it wasn't strange that he found it odd. The physical strength of the mountain goblin's body varied greatly from front to back. It turned out that his first slash had landed on its fingernail, which was quite strong and would make for good material for refining equipment. Moreover, since it grew on a mountain goblin's body, it should have some spiritual properties. However, getting his hands on it wouldn't be easy, so he decided to forget about it for now and maybe try again in the future.

  The sound of a helicopter came from the air, and a helicopter slowly descended, hovering above the crowd's heads, about 20 meters away from the ground. A soft ladder was dropped down, and two people climbed down, one of whom carried a strange box on his back.

  "Alright, Captain Yan, it's all settled!" a middle-aged man asked.

  "Reporting to leader, everything is resolved, but one personnel is injured and needs emergency transportation to hospital for treatment!" Yan Bing gave a salute, and the other party also returned a military salute.

  A middle-aged man glanced at Wang Yong, waved his hand upwards, the helicopter descended a bit more, and from above, a stretcher was lowered down to lift Wang Yong up, and the plane flew away into the distance.

  "Wait a minute, Captain Yan, there's another helicopter coming. What about our stuff?" asked the middle-aged man.

  Yan Bing took out several jade boxes from the bag, and the middle-aged man nodded. The person behind him who was carrying a box put it down, took out a stainless steel thermos-like container, put the jade boxes in it, sealed it tightly, and then put it back in the box.

  Liu Zhi looked at the two of them and whispered to Lai Jixue: "Do you know these two?"

  Lai Jixue shook his head, perhaps feeling Liu Zhi's gaze. The middle-aged man turned to Liu Zhi and seemed to recognize him, extending his hand: "You are Liu Zhi, I am Qi Fengshan, the provincial chief in charge."

  Liu Zhi stretched out his hand and shook it, without saying a word. He understood that the other party should have some understanding of him. It seemed that he had unknowingly caught their attention, perhaps it was during that time in Shencheng.

  Another helicopter arrived, this time taking away the entire body of Shan Gui. Qi Fengshan even wanted to dig up the whole Zhu Guo tree, but Lai Jixue said bluntly that if he wanted to get rid of Zhu Guo, he should just dig it up!

  Qi Fengshan and others hesitated for a while, but ultimately did not move the jujube tree. They took off in the helicopter first, and Yan Bing and everyone else returned by the original route.

  Lai Jixue muttered to himself, saying that this time he didn't gain any benefits. Yan Bing said coldly: "These are all national assets, the country will thoroughly investigate, don't think about embezzling!"

  "Has the number of people embezzling state-owned assets decreased?" Lai Jixue complained to Liu Zhizhi in a low voice, "Doing things for the country is just suffering a loss! No benefits have been gained!"

  Liu Zhi smiled and said in a low voice: "I didn't have any hope, I just came to broaden my horizons!"

  "Lai Jixue, you see that Liu Zhi's ideological realm is much higher than yours, learn from him!" Yan Bing seemed to have a big opinion about Lai Jixue.

  "What era is this, still talking about ideological realm? And those officials don't know how many benefits they've gained. I just want to take them as an example!" Lai Jixue's voice was low, but the crowd could still hear it.

  Yan Bing ignored him and turned to Liu Zhi Zhuo, saying: "Liu Zhi Zhuo, are you interested in joining us? There are many benefits, privileges, and resources that can be easily obtained. It will also greatly help your martial arts training!"

  Liu Zhiyi performed well today, she is a professional, Liu Zhiyi is obviously a practical talent, from today's performance, compared to some peripheral masters she has seen before, the feeling is stronger.

  "My wish is not here, I just want to be free and unrestricted!" Liu Zhi Zhi calmly refused.

  "You have a good martial arts foundation, it's a pity if you don't use it to serve the country. Moreover, you rarely have real battles, your martial arts skills want to break through the bottleneck, how can they be possible without actual combat? Before liberation, many masters emerged, those were all forged in the midst of blood and fire, now is a peaceful era, only by serving the country will you have the opportunity to break through the bottleneck! Yan Bing may not be a national martial arts master, but there are many national martial arts masters in the organization, often listening to their discussions, he knows a lot."

  This remark moved Liu Zhi's heart, not because he joined a special department, but because Shao Yan had said that in order to enter the realm of internal energy, one must have a spirit in their fist. Before liberation, those martial arts predecessors who held a patriotic heart already had a kind of grand spirit within them, and only when they merged this spirit with their martial arts in actual combat did high-level masters emerge. So what kind of spirit has he come to realize?

  Liu Zhi couldn't help but fall into deep thought.

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