Chapter 499: Attacking Chongping Mountain

As they talked while walking, Ma Chun and Lin Dong arrived at the front yard, where the six top chefs from Lin’s Inn had already gathered at the kitchen entrance. Below their feet lay a man at the fifth level of the Mental Energy stage and five underlings, motionless as if lifeless.
“Chongping Mountain, you go first,” Lin Dong said calmly.
“Let’s go, Chongping Mountain!” Qiao Tianhao waved his arms excitedly, acting as if he were the leader giving orders.
Jiang Kui and the others each grabbed one of them and soared into the air. To Qiao Tianhao, it seemed like they were following his orders. His sense of achievement soared, and he grabbed the remaining underling, even looking up at Lin Dong and saying, “Hurry up.”
Lin Dong didn’t bother to pay attention to the overly excited Qiao Tianhao. He turned to Ma Chun and said, “Get Lin’s Inn next door open as soon as possible. This trip will likely take at least two or three days to return. Jiang Kui should have arranged apprentices to take their place. I’ll raise the defensive formation further. There won’t be much of a problem with cooking skills, but the only impact will be on Emperor Qianwei. An inn with peak-level experts in charge will only make him cautious. But if this inn acts ruthlessly, wiping out a stronghold with thousands of people in one go, it might make him suspect that the inn is targeting ordinary people after being suppressed, prompting him to devise even stricter plans. Find time to contact Yang Shun and have him figure out as much as possible about Emperor Qianwei’s plans for Lin’s Inn. Of course, the prerequisite is that he must ensure his own safety. If he gets exposed, not only will we not know the detailed plans, but we won’t even know when Emperor Qianwei intends to act.”
Ma Chun nodded firmly.
Lin Dong said no more. He opened the inn system and increased the cooking skill boost for four of the stoves from twice to the maximum of eight times. Raising it to eight times would significantly increase the consumption of spirit stones, but it would be enough to reduce the cooking skills of those apprentices to the same level as those of Jiang Kui and the other four top chefs—effectively causing them to suffer from a collective cold, thus minimizing the impact on their cooking skills.
With a flick of his toes, Lin Dong shed his middle-aged appearance, transformed into a streak of aurora, and disappeared from the front yard.
Along the way, Lin Dong caught up with the group. With his spiritual energy surging, he grabbed Jiang Kui, who was the slowest, and flew swiftly, raising the group’s overall speed by a notch.

Chongping Mountain is located 70 li south of the capital city, stretching for dozens of li. Due to its lack of spiritual energy, it is even disregarded by smaller sects. Situated between the county seat of Konglin and the capital, and with Konglin being the necessary route from the southern parts of the Han Dynasty to the capital, many merchants choose to cut across Chongping Mountain, which is not very high, to save the hundred li journey. As a result, Chongping Mountain has become a paradise for bandits.

On Chongping Mountain, there are countless large and small strongholds, with the larger ones preying on the smaller ones, and those in turn on even smaller groups. Every year, the imperial court sends warriors to find reasons to destroy one or two of these large strongholds to prevent them from growing too powerful. This leads to a situation where no single force can truly dominate the mountain, yet constant battles and skirmishes occur everywhere. Here, one or two strongholds are destroyed every day, while at the same time, fearless and ruthless individuals gather from various places to establish their own strongholds.

The arrival of Lin Dong and his seven companions quickly caught the attention of spies lurking throughout Chongping Mountain. The reason was naturally that they were not accompanied by large amounts of goods, but each of them wore rings that clearly were storage spirit rings.

They weren’t afraid that the “easy targets” might be strong; they were afraid that they might not actually be worth targeting.

On Chongping Mountain, as long as you dared to enter with a large amount of goods, even if you had peak-level protectors, there were still strongholds willing to rob you. Not even a one-in-ten-thousand or one-in-million chance could stop the desires of some bandits.

Similarly, if you climbed the mountain with empty hands, unless you were dressed in luxurious clothes, no one would pay attention to you. Of course, this did not include those who wore ordinary clothes but carried storage spirit rings. Such people were clearly warriors, and just their storage spirit rings were worth hundreds of taels of silver, with some valuable items inside as well.

No one paid much attention to their strength. The people here didn’t understand concepts like avoiding danger or recognizing when the risks outweighed the rewards. They only knew that if there was an easy target, they couldn’t let it slip away. Only if the target had unshakable strength would most bandits instinctively choose to give up.

Therefore, even sect disciples who dared to come to Chongping Mountain still faced the risk of being killed. Every few years, some sects would indeed send people to avenge their disciples.

However, revenge couldn’t stop these strongholds from treating sect disciples as easy targets as well. After all, no sect would easily destroy a large stronghold. The reason was that, according to the records of the Tianwei Pavilion, killing bandits was equivalent to killing ordinary people.

Small sects can kill at most a thousand people in ten years, medium-sized sects at most three thousand, while large sects can kill ten thousand. Exceeding this limit means crossing the threshold set by Tianwei Pavilion—minor penalties include arresting the killers, while severe penalties involve destroying the sect. A bandit camp can easily have over a hundred members, with larger ones reaching tens of thousands. If such a camp is destroyed, even large sects would be pushing beyond Tianwei Pavilion’s limits. Moreover, this period spans ten years, and the total count includes all disciples; seriously injuring or disabling people also contributes to the total. Thus, to seek revenge, one can only kill a few unimportant leaders of the camp—never the leader himself, as his death would drive everyone in the camp to charge at the sect in a suicidal frenzy. With Tianwei Pavilion’s restraint in place, although large sects are far stronger than bandits, they are powerless against them. Tianwei Pavilion provides amulets for bandits for a reason. Bandits from various regions are mostly violent and unruly individuals, and the imperial court has encouraged them to embrace a life of banditry since its founding. In other words, the Great Han Nation has long treated bandit camps as concentration camps for such vicious people. The cost is some merchants who take risks with their goods, but the benefit is a reduction in threats across the country. Once bandit camps can no longer serve as havens for bandits, or if they are destroyed, these violent individuals will remain and cause trouble locally. Whether in terms of losses or easier centralized management to control the total number of bandits, it is far more cost-effective to provide them with a paradise where they can feast, drink freely, and occasionally kill. In truth, large sects also have reasons not to destroy bandits. Without them, it would be difficult to reinforce the idea among the people of the Great Han Nation that strength surpasses wealth and status, which would prevent groups of talents from joining sects each year to learn martial arts for their resources. Lin Dong, with his abilities, was clearly aware of being watched, as were Cheng Bao and the others. Yet none of them showed the slightest sign of tension. This place was indeed a den of wolves and ghosts, but with strong strength at their backs, their courage grew infinitely. Some even harbored expectations. After passing through dense bushes, what appeared before everyone’s eyes was a small, undulating but relatively open grassland.

“Let’s do it here!” When they reached the center of the small grassland, Cheng Bao suddenly said, “At the foot of the mountain are clusters of small bandit camps. Fighting here means more people will see us.”
Lin Dong waved his hand, and everyone stopped immediately.
Just as he was about to give the order to start, suddenly, a loud roar came from behind them.
“Everyone, listen up! You’re surrounded! Hand over your storage spirit rings, or we’ll crush your bones and scatter your ashes!” A bare-chested giant swung his big sword and leaped up from the grass, followed by over twenty more bandits emerging all around them.
With this sudden attack, Lin Dong and his group truly seemed to be surrounded.
Lin Dong smiled and ignored them. Jiang Kui and the others also smiled, turning a deaf ear to the giant’s words. Qiao Tianhao smiled the widest, his mouth stretched wide without closing for a long time.
The giant’s face twisted with anger and frustration. He knew these people weren’t easy to deal with—they clearly were trained fighters. But were bandits really that easy to handle?
“You kids, you’re dead!” The giant raised his right arm to swing down when a lowly thug suddenly ran up to him and whispered in his ear.
The giant raised his head suspiciously, glanced at the bandits at Lin Dong’s feet, and finally fixed his gaze on the fifth-level Mind Phase bandit at Jiang Kui’s feet. Surprise flashed in his eyes.
“Do you know him?”
Cheng Bao stepped on one of the bandits’ faces and glanced at the giant indifferently.
“What if I do? What if I don’t?” The giant ignored Cheng Bao’s tone, tilting his head and staring at him sideways.
“If you do, you can call a few more people to watch. Of course, just to watch.” Cheng Bao opened his right palm, and a golden sword appeared in his hand. With a flash of gold light, it stopped between the giant’s spread fingers.
With a light press, the golden sword sliced through a finger effortlessly. It then bounced gracefully, with its tip landing next to another finger. Another light press, and yet another finger separated from the hand…
The giant was amused—this was revenge! And it was revenge against the leading bandit camp.
He didn’t know the bandits whose fingers were being cut off one by one, but he recognized the leader—the famous minor boss of Skull Camp.
Skull Camp was the largest bandit camp in Chongping Mountain. Its members were all at least at the first level of Mind Phase, with the camp leader and several key figures among the strongest. Their total number exceeded ten thousand. Such strength made them not only the foremost in Chongping Mountain but also among the top in the entire Han Empire.

Seeking to bring misfortune to Skeleton Fort must be an exhilarating thing in the eyes of these strong men.
“Brother, you’ve got spirit! If you’re strong enough, I’ll lend you a hand.”
The giant gave Cheng Bao a thumbs up, then, with a shout, turned and left with his men.
“Brothers, get the drums ready—beat them everywhere to announce that someone is trying to bring misfortune to Skeleton Fort in the grasslands. Those who want to join in, bring good wine, meat, and swords!”