Volume 3, Chapter 35 – Taking Them In

As an international-standard six-star hotel, Nansheng International naturally had its own conference rooms, council halls, and other facilities for official occasions.

Stepping into the hall, Bai Xiang was still dressed in that dark-black robe and skirt.

The difference was her hairstyle. Most of her soft white hair was now gathered up and bound behind her head, fixed in place by a dark-golden hairpin shaped like a Buddha’s hand, thrust through horizontally.

This was not some kind of “matron’s bun,” not a hairstyle marking a married woman. It belonged instead to the “Soaring Immortal, Coiling Cloud Bun” in ancient Yu ceremonial style, suited to unmarried women of high status who were not of the imperial bloodline.

Daoist Pei Jian, Dao Lord of Huangxi Sword Dao, had already led everyone here to wait in respectful welcome. Seeing Bai Xiang approach with a long sword at her waist and wide sleeves drifting as she walked, they all stood up in unison and, under Pei Jian’s lead, bowed to her.

“Respectfully welcoming Dao Lord Bai!”

“Dao Lord Pei, no need to stand on ceremony.” Bai Xiang went straight to the main seat and sat down, her gaze sweeping over the faces of all the guests. “You’ve all come here today—what business do you have?”

These were all old acquaintances.

She thought to herself.

No need to mention Pei Jian. Huangxi Sword Dao had been the very first dojo she’d gone to “slap in the face” back then, and he, along with his son Pei Xuan, had left quite an impression on her. Because they were among the rare few who, after recognizing reality, did not harbor excessive resentment toward her—on the contrary, they’d thanked her for holding back.

—Back then, she had condensed her momentum and struck one sword at the main hall of Huangxi Sword Dao. Pei Xuan, young and hot-blooded, not knowing how terrifying that was, had tried to rush in with just his physical body to block it. If she hadn’t had absolute control over her sword qi, at that distance he would definitely have been cleaved cleanly in two.

And among the others here, more than half were Dao Lords she had given trouble to in the past.

For example, Dao Lord Jiang Qian of Feiyu Sword Dao, Dao Lord Lu Feng of Baihe Sword Dao, and Dao Lord Zhu Hongyi of Qinghe Sword Dao—every one of them had taken a heavy loss in her hands.

Especially Jiang Qian. That guy had fought her to the death back then, refusing to let her cut down his main hall. So Bai Xiang simply cut off his four limbs and tossed him out onto the street, which directly tanked Feiyu Sword Dao’s reputation, and Jiang Qian himself became a laughingstock. It was said he even came down with a serious illness afterward.

Now Jiang Qian’s four limbs looked fine enough, but under Bai Xiang’s qi presence scan, she could sense the truth within: those were four mechanical prosthetics forged of metal, merely hidden under gloves and boots so they looked relatively natural.

This Jiang Qian suffered that big of a loss, and he still swallows his pride to come begging me now.

Bai Xiang narrowed her eyes inwardly.

Whatever’s driven them over here… is even less human than they are.

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“Dao Lord Bai…” Pei Jian was clearly the organizer of this move. At her question, he immediately began pouring out his grievances. “We know that in the past we offended Dao Lord Bai in many ways. But this time we sincerely beg Dao Lord Bai to give us another chance, to let us merge under Maozhou’s jurisdiction!”

Sure enough, here to defect.

Bai Zhuqing, standing at Bai Xiang’s side like a secretary, tensed up inside as soon as she heard that.

On the surface, little dojos like Huangxi Sword Dao and Feiyu Sword Dao didn’t seem to have much overlap with a large gang like the Jingyi Gang. But in reality, that wasn’t true at all; most small dojos had at least a bit of “black” in their background.

The Bai family ran a dojo themselves. Even if she hadn’t understood this at first, just from listening to the elders chat now and then, Bai Zhuqing had picked up a basic understanding.

How do gangs survive?

At the most basic level: fighting for turf, collecting “protection,” handing out loans.

The more “advanced” version was organizing “drug testers”—gathering those willing to sell themselves, then “selling” them in one batch to pharmaceutical companies for clinical trials, taking a cut in the middle as the broker’s fee.

On top of that, if they had a few storefronts, doing some forced business here and there that wouldn’t leave the suckers completely ruined, then it wasn’t too hard for a gang to keep itself going.

These kinds of gangs were small-time. They were mixing it up in the world, but they still barely held onto a sliver of a human bottom line, and basically had some rigid internal rules.

Like: no drugs, no prostitution, scores settled clean, grudges don’t extend to family.

But if they wanted to grow any bigger, they had to stop acting like people.

Take the prior Shiyou Gang for example. They weren’t just involved in all kinds of filthy businesses; they were also tied into the most infamous black market around Chilong, involved in human trafficking and organ trading—truly committing every evil under the sun.

When she took over Shiyou Gang, Bai Xiang had been extremely ruthless. She’d set up a system of internal mutual reporting and basically slaughtered all the truly vicious and foremost ringleaders, leaving only the small-time thugs and errand boys who had “never seen the big scenes” and whose “hands hadn’t yet had time to be stained with blood” to serve as labor. If they performed well, she would consider gradually promoting them into block-level small bosses, scattered about to maintain basic order at the bottom.

This was the only way she could do it, because Maozhou didn’t even have an Inspectorate system set up yet. The patrolling inspectors were all borrowed from Chilong through calling in favors from Zhang Daoming. If she didn’t make use of these people, there simply wouldn’t be enough manpower to keep things under control.

And these gangs fought each other too. They fought over turf, and they’d also get into giant brawls over business and profit.

So here’s the problem—since in the gang world, force was so important, how could the various Sword Dao dojos scattered through the surrounding streets possibly keep themselves untouched by this whirlpool of strife?

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Your dojo opens today, and tomorrow the Jinlong Gang and the Yinlong Gang have a brutal turf war and suffer miserable losses. The Jinlong boss vows to strengthen himself and learn martial arts, and then, with a great roar, drags a bunch of little brothers and bundles of cash into your dojo to formally become disciples. Do you accept or not?

If you accept, from then on you’re entangled with the underground gangs; the Jinlong Gang and your dojo back each other.

If you refuse, either the Jinlong Gang smashes your signboard, or you display overwhelming might and flatten them—at which point your reputation spreads for a while and you attract even more vicious gangs.

Unless you had backing at the top, or, like Bai Shengju, had earned favors by saving a lot of high officials and nobles during the demon chaos and thus gained connections, and your dojo just happened to sit in a strictly controlled, prosperous district—otherwise, don’t even think about cutting yourself off from gangs.

So little dojos like Huangxi Sword Dao and Feiyu Sword Dao absolutely had local gangs behind them as mutual backing.

Going one step further: what kind of force could push these dojos to the point of admitting they couldn’t go on, to the point that they’d band together to seek refuge with their “enemy,” Bai Xiang… It really seemed like the only possibility was the Jingyi Gang.

A three-thousand-strong gang—that scale really was something.

Back in its heyday, Shiyou Gang had controlled the northern district of Chilong, and even then they’d only had five to six hundred men. Now three thousand members of the Jingyi Gang had suddenly flooded into Chilong Circuit—that was like tipping a school of piranhas into a small river; of course they’d squeeze out the survival space of the local gangs.

And their methods were extremely harsh and cruel. Just from the expressions on Pei Jian and the others’ faces, it was obvious they’d taken a severe beating in the shadows.

Sure enough, Bai Xiang had only let a hint of curiosity show, and these people immediately started pouring their miseries out to her.

Pei Jian’s home was gone.

The entire site of Huangxi Sword Dao had been seized by the Jingyi Gang, along with the land and assets—swallowed whole. His son Pei Xuan had tried to stop them and had his leg broken for it, and was now hiding out at an acquaintance’s place to recover.

Jiang Qian hadn’t just had his city dojo taken. One of his two daughters had been killed, and the other humiliated; the one who survived had turned into an idiot, unable even to control her own bowels.

As for Lu Feng and Zhu Hongyi, the two of them had been relatively quick-witted. Before trouble hit, they’d already arranged for their families to hide away. But they still couldn’t escape having their land seized and their assets swallowed. Their family businesses were entirely taken over, and going to the police or filing complaints with officials did nothing at all.

That really was bitter.

It wasn’t just taking your place of business—they’d go straight to killing your family and wiping out your roots.

Compared to that, what Bai Xiang had done back then was far milder. No wonder they’d banded together to come here, begging to be taken in and assigned posts under Maozhou.

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Inside her sleeve, Bai Zhuqing clenched her fist, finally understanding why Bai Xiang had been so sure that Zhang Xianzhi wasn’t a good person.

No kidding—you’re the highest administrative authority in a place. With gangs, it’s only a question of whether you want to crack down or not; there is no such thing as “you can’t manage them.”

If you say gangs are part of the local “ecosystem,” part of the “atmosphere,” and that you can’t wipe them all out and must leave some, to help take pressure off other systems—fine, Bai Zhuqing could accept that.

But to indulge an outside gang like the Jingyi Gang in squeezing and exploiting the local citizens—that really was indefensible!

So this is a kind of test too?

Bai Zhuqing’s thoughts were a mess for a moment. She realized she couldn’t see through what those big figures were really thinking at all.

Zhang Xianzhi letting the Jingyi Gang poison the people—was it because he felt he needed this new force to wash away the old things in Chilong Circuit and stamp his own mark on it? Or was he simply using them to test Sister Xiang’er, to probe her attitude toward this kind of approach?

Was everything happening in Chilong Circuit right now just a rehearsal for the future? As long as we didn’t care, would they dare to arrange even more gangs and new officials to flood into Maozhou?

What will Sister Xiang’er do…?

Bai Zhuqing couldn’t help glancing worriedly at Bai Xiang.

With her own temperament, it would definitely be: if you dare to cause trouble, I’ll beat you up.

And with Bai Xiang’s temperament, it would be even harsher—she wouldn’t just beat you up, she’d ask you how many heads you think you have.

But right now was supposed to be a “truce,” wasn’t it?

Grandmaster had just caused a stir, and Sister Xiang’er had said herself that it wasn’t appropriate to make a move against that side for the time being.

At a moment like this, faced with this kind of test—

How were they supposed to answer it?

“I understand what you’re asking for.” Bai Xiang spoke, and the hall immediately fell quiet.

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“I’ve dealt with all of you before, and there were indeed some unpleasantnesses in the past. But compared to those truly evil villains, at least you people keep a sliver of bottom line in how you act. In today’s Chilong, that’s already rare.”

So that means…?

Hope unconsciously rose on the faces of Pei Jian and the others.

“Zhuqing, get their registrations.” Bai Xiang turned to instruct her younger sister. “And have Manager Lu arrange some suites for them.”

Then she looked back at Pei Jian. “I’ll be staying in Chilong Circuit for about a week. You’d best use this time to call together everyone you want to bring under control. In a week, you’ll return with me.”

Pei Jian was overjoyed and immediately moved to lead everyone in a kneeling salute. “Many thanks, Dao Lord Bai!”

“Dao Lord Bai is truly righteous!”

“Don’t be in such a hurry to thank me.” Bai Xiang’s face, however, showed little expression.

“Let me say the ugly part up front: if anyone changes their mind later, then don’t come to blame me afterward.”

Hm?

Everyone present was stunned.

Especially Pei Jian—the old fox. He’d dealt with plenty of officials and had a deep feel for this sort of warning.

He stared closely at Bai Xiang’s expression, and even after she left the hall, he still hadn’t figured out what lay behind those words.

Those final remarks of hers were rather inexplicable. Did they have some other way out?

Surely it couldn’t be… that something major was about to happen in Chilong?