Chapter 103: The Interrogation

The man took a deep drag from the cigarette I had placed in his mouth, a trace of intoxication flickering across his face. Yet, just as he was about to inhale a second time, a sudden grimace twisted his features.

Sensing something was amiss, I instinctively moved to clamp his jaw shut, but it was too late. A trickle of black blood oozed slowly from the corner of his mouth.

White Frost was the first to cry out in shock, then she struck my forehead sharply, scolding, “Wu Dao, are you crazy? Why did you kill him?”

I wasn’t sure when she had developed the habit of tapping my forehead like that. Honestly, I hated it. I turned and glared at her fiercely. “Are you blind? It’s obvious he concealed poison in his mouth!”

“Oh.” White Frost murmured, suddenly producing a bucket of popcorn from somewhere, stuffing a handful into her mouth and falling silent.

It seemed the man was a suicidal agent, aware the mission had failed. To protect the organization behind him, he had decisively taken poison and ended his own life.

Just as I feared our plan had fallen apart, Qin Yu suddenly pulled a translucent jade bottle from his person. After uttering a swift incantation, the man’s soul—his three souls and seven spirits—who had been dispersing, were suddenly drawn back by a force emanating from the jade bottle and instantly sucked inside.

Within the bottle, the man’s soul howled wildly, but Qin Yu paid it no mind, immediately sealing the lid.

“What do we do now?” I asked.

Qin Yu pocketed the bottle containing the man’s soul. “Tonight, someone is coming to retrieve the Nine Yin Fate. If they don’t return before dawn, it will surely arouse suspicion. Even if we find their base, they will be on guard.”

My brow furrowed tightly. “If we want to catch them all in one sweep, tonight is the only chance. As long as we find their location, we can strike them unawares. But since he was so quick to poison himself, even with his soul in this bottle, we might not extract any information.”

“Leave it to me!” Wang Feiyang, who had been silent until now, suddenly reached out toward Qin Yu and said expressionlessly, “Before midnight, I will get all the information we want from him.”

Qin Yu eyed Wang Feiyang skeptically and hesitated to hand over the jade bottle. Only when I nodded at her did she reluctantly pass it to him.

Without a word, Wang Feiyang took the bottle and turned to leave.

“Do you really think your friend can break him?” Qin Yu finally asked after Wang Feiyang disappeared into the darkness.

I didn’t know either, but having known Wang Feiyang for so many years, I knew he never joked and never took on something without confidence. I nodded. “If he says so, it must be possible.”

“Good,” Qin Yu said. “Before midnight, we’ll prepare everything. Once your friend gets the info, we strike immediately.”

I pondered for a moment, then asked, “Yu Jie, you saw that copper-armored corpse just now. Without Wang Feiyang’s silence charm, we struggled to deal with it. What if their base is guarded by many such copper-armored corpses?”

This was my greatest worry. Tonight was our best chance, but we had no idea how strong the enemy really was. Their Five Elements corpses were no ordinary monsters—their bodies were as hard as iron, with tremendous strength. Ordinary Taoist arts barely harmed them. If the enemy had more than we could handle, our raid might backfire, and we wouldn’t capture the organization but doom ourselves.

Yet, Qin Yu showed no frustration. “I considered that long ago. I’ve studied the puppet documents Officer Peng gave me multiple times, and I had him check unnatural death cases from last year and before. All signs of puppets appeared only within a year.”

“You mean that group has been in Bashu City for less than a year?”

“Yes,” Qin Yu nodded. “Based on the data and my knowledge of corpse refining, they could have made fewer than ten Five Elements corpses in that time, with at most three copper-armored ones, which are the strongest.”

“What about silver-armored corpses? Could they have those?” I asked.

“Impossible,” a Maoshan Taoist nearby answered. “Refining Five Elements corpses is extremely difficult. Ten destiny patterns merging into one doesn’t guarantee one corpse. To make a copper-armored corpse, it must be upgraded from an iron-armored one. In a year, with ten iron-armored corpses, the chance of upgrading one to copper is less than thirty percent. So three copper-armored corpses is already the limit.”

Hearing this, I felt somewhat reassured. I didn’t ask about silver-armored corpses further. According to their explanation, even if the enemy found rare fate patterns like Nine Yin or Sanhua, they couldn’t refine silver-armored corpses within a year.

“Ten iron-armored corpses, three copper-armored ones,” I weighed it. “With all of us combined, maybe we can take them on. As for the rest of the organization?”

“We’ll leave that to the police,” Qin Yu explained. “If they’re human, the police can handle them.” This was why she dared to launch a surprise attack tonight.

I nodded. “Then let’s prepare immediately. I already called Peng Li at the station. He’s been busy mobilizing police forces. Although the Paranormal Investigation Team is new and lacks privileges, with Peng Lei backing Peng Li, it shouldn’t be a problem.”

After finalizing everything, we began preparations and agreed that at midnight, once Wang Feiyang extracted the information, we would act.

On the way back, I immediately called Peng Li and told him to be ready; we might move at midnight.

Peng Li assured me he had secured approval from Peng Lei, who had even brought in the armed police due to the many murders involved.

I was thrilled. With armed police support, maybe we wouldn’t even need to fight the Five Elements corpses ourselves—just a burst of gunfire would finish off iron or copper-armored ones alike.

Instead of returning to school, I went with Qin Yu and the others to the Sanhua Xuan Pavilion. Over the next few hours, I kept busy, drawing more than a dozen Six Ding Six Jia exorcism talismans, ready for anything.

Qin Yu also made several talismans and produced a finely crafted short sword, its sheath engraved with the characters “Yu Nu.” I had no idea of its origin, but it looked formidable.

As for White Frost, she prepared nothing, content to eat popcorn nonstop—several buckets in just a few hours.

Around 11:30 p.m., my phone finally rang. I hurriedly answered; it was Wang Feiyang.

“Brother Yang, any luck? Did you get the information?”

“Got it,” Wang Feiyang said coolly. “The location is Shuanglong Town, Ye Family Village.”