A Mage in the Martial Arts World - Chapter 003
Li Wei decided to take a break.
He walked over to Chuang’s side, glanced at the Natural Dao Sutra lying on the bedding, and reached out to put it away.
The moment his hand touched it, the heavenly book — once invulnerable to water and fire — instantly turned into a pile of white ash, losing all trace of its original form.
“Phew!” He exhaled a long, turbid breath, feeling a wave of relief wash over him.
He had been wondering what to do with it, but since it had turned to ashes on its own, that problem was now conveniently solved.
He rolled up the quilt, tied it neatly, opened a hidden compartment, and stuffed it inside.
Since the Natural Dao Sutra was so mystical, could its ashes be special too? He decided to study them later.
As he walked past a jade statue, he instinctively reached out and pressed its eyes a few times with his finger.
Immediately, a door appeared on the wall, and behind it stretched a long passage leading underground.
Li Wei froze in surprise as he stared at the suddenly revealed portal.
That action — pressing the statue’s eyes — had been completely subconscious. It wasn’t as if he’d received any related memory from the body’s original owner.
What was going on? Could it be that the original owner’s memories were incomplete, and what he’d inherited was missing something?
Just as he was thinking that, he felt a sudden stirring in his mind.
Before his eyes flashed a blur of light, and once again, he found himself within the original owner’s sea of consciousness.
“Is your uselessness endless? What are you doing now?” Li Wei roared furiously.
Despite his anger, his actions remained steady. He quickly looked around — and immediately noticed that, in addition to the lingering remnants of both his and the original owner’s souls, there was something new: the glowing character Dao (道), transformed from the words in the Natural Dao Sutra.
It hung high above their heads, radiating strange fluctuations. Under its influence, the gray mist began to thin, the sea of consciousness brightening, no longer so lifeless.
What happened next made Li Wei realize he had completely misunderstood the original owner’s remnant soul this time.
As soon as he regained his footing, a thin black thread extended from the Dao character, reaching toward the remnant soul like a flexible tentacle.
When the original owner’s soul approached, the thread suddenly shot out, piercing between his brows and pulling outward, as though trying to extract something.
The original owner’s soul twisted in pain, struggling violently, but it was useless.
Soon, a jelly-like ball was pulled out from between his brows.
The thin black line turned, stretching toward Li Wei.
He could feel that it wanted to give him that jelly-like thing.
Just then, the original owner’s remnant soul froze — a red light burst from his eyes, and his body began swelling again, even faster than before.
He was about to explode.
Li Wei was startled and instinctively flew backward, trying to hide behind the Dao character — it was the only thing he could think of to shield himself from the explosion.
But then he quickly realized there was no need to be nervous — the remnant soul couldn’t harm him anymore.
A thicker black line lashed out from the Dao character at lightning speed, whipping the remnant soul’s body.
The soul convulsed in agony. Its inflated form quickly deflated like a punctured balloon, shrinking smaller and smaller — even tinier than its normal state — until it finally stopped, weak and sluggish.
“Haha…” Li Wei laughed. “You useless fool! You forced me to read the Natural Dao Sutra, and now you’ve gotten what you deserved. Retribution! Serves you right!”
His tone dripped with satisfaction and schadenfreude.
At last, he felt completely at ease — though a small trace of regret remained.
He still couldn’t control the Dao character himself to erase the remnant soul entirely, but he was sure that day wasn’t far off.
His attention shifted back to the thin black thread before him. Tentatively, he reached out to touch the jelly-like object at its tip.
A faint sting spread through his fingertips — and the jelly-like thing vanished into thin air.
“That’s it?” he muttered. Just as he raised his hand to check, he realized something new had appeared in his mind — a fresh memory.
It wasn’t much, but it slightly changed how he viewed the original owner.
It turned out that the man hadn’t been completely unwilling to work hard — his willpower had just been terribly weak. Spoiled by his overly indulgent family, he’d never been allowed to suffer even a little, so everything he did was half-hearted and short-lived. Naturally, he achieved nothing.
That secret chamber — the one he’d just opened — had been built by the original owner before he fell into complete ruin.
It had been meant as a quiet place for cultivation, but had long since been abandoned. He hadn’t opened it in nearly two years.
The memory of its interior was hazy, but Li Wei’s curiosity was piqued. He decided to make use of it again — he wanted to go inside and take a look first.
Knock, knock… Just as he waited for the musty air inside the chamber to dissipate, a knock sounded at the door.
He quickly pressed the jade statue’s eyes a few times with a specific technique, sealing the hidden door to the chamber.
“What is it?” he called without opening the door.
“Young Master, Master Yu from the Four Seas Trading Company wishes to see you.”
“No.”
“Little Marquis, he only wants to ask how your preparations for tomorrow’s God of War Conference are going.”
“Can’t wait to hand me your money already?”
“Don’t worry about the silver, Little Marquis. As long as you win, not a single coin will be lost. But if you don’t… how should I explain that to the Marquis and the Old Marquis? Have you thought about that? I advise you to prepare early — otherwise, it’ll be too late when trouble comes.”
“Fat Fish, are you looking for a fight?”
“Why so angry, Little Marquis? I only mean well. If you’re upset, I’ll apologize.”
“Apologize to your mother’s kindness! Get out! Old Wei, throw that fat fish out — if he resists, break his legs!”
“Little Marquis, why the insults? I’m being sincere—”
“Master Yu, please leave,” Old Wei interrupted. “Don’t make things difficult for this old servant.”
“The dignified Little Marquis, yet such a petty heart… truly disappointing. Hmph, if I’d known this, I wouldn’t have come at all. I show kindness and get treated like a fool. Next time…”
The voice faded gradually — the man was gone.
“What a disgrace,” Li Wei muttered, shaking his head. “A dignified Little Marquis, yet he lets a merchant’s son block his door and taunt him. Pathetic.”
He couldn’t help but sigh at how hopeless the original owner had been.
Yu Deshui’s visit made Li Wei change his mind. He decided to postpone exploring the secret chamber and instead check the adjacent room first.
He found the key, unlocked a two-pound brass lock, and pushed open the door to a dimly lit room.
As soon as he entered, a faint unease stirred in him. He reached for a thin rope hanging by the door and gave it a sharp tug. The curtains flew open, and the room suddenly filled with light.
In the sunlight streaming through the windows, he could clearly see the layout — it was extremely simple. There were no tables, chairs, or other furnishings, just two rows of wooden shelves.
On those shelves stood countless clay pots — hundreds of them.
He quickly walked up to the largest and most finely crafted pot, gently lifted the lid, and peered inside.
Thanks to his keen eyesight, he could see clearly — and immediately, his expression tensed.
The “General” wasn’t moving.
Of course, the “General” living in that clay pot wasn’t a real general, but a cricket — the finest one the original owner had ever found.
To obtain it, the original owner had spent 220,000 taels of silver to buy the entire estate where it had been discovered. Later, in order to capture it, he’d nearly razed the whole place to the ground.
But the cricket had not disappointed him. It was large, strong, fierce, with excellent endurance — and, more importantly, it was intelligent, skilled at spotting its opponents’ weaknesses.
It had fought twenty-one matches, winning every single one, and in over ten of them, it had killed its opponents outright. Its fame spread far and wide; everyone in Golden City knew its name.
Thanks to its victories, the original owner had earned a fortune — over ten million taels of silver in total, a sum large enough to make ordinary people faint.
The so-called “God of War Conference” was actually a cricket-fighting tournament, and his main rival was none other than the young master of the Four Seas Trading Company — the same man who had just come to provoke him.
He’d recently acquired a fine fighting cricket — a famed coffin-headed variety called Tai Sui, named for its little head that looks like a tiny coffin.
Tai Sui hadn’t fought as often as the General—only thirteen matches—but he’d won every single one, biting his opponents to death each time. Ferocious didn’t begin to cover it.
It was that record that had driven Yu Deshui to challenge the original owner. Confident he wouldn’t lose, Yu Deshui pressed the challenge and the original owner, equally sure, accepted.
Both sides wagered heavily on the match: fifteen million taels of silver, plus 150 purebred sweat-bl00d BMWs—amounting, the boast went, to a total value of more than 3,000 taels of silver.
The original owner staked Crescent Lake, a modest lake named for its crescent shape.
Elsewhere a small lake would be worth far less than thirty million taels, but here, in the Golden City, water was more precious than oil. Crescent Lake supplied one-third of the city’s water; its value was incalculable.
The original owner planned to use Crescent Lake to show his grandfather and father he could succeed—and his confidence came from the General.
If something happened to the General, it would be catastrophic.
Crescent Lake mattered too much to the Golden City and to the Li family. If it were lost, the damage would be immeasurable. Even with his grandfather and father spoiling him, they wouldn’t let it go easily; he’d have to fight tooth and nail for months.
Now the original owner was hiccuping through life, his body occupied by a time-traveler — by Li Wei — and he didn’t want to be humiliated.
What a waste. Leaving such a mess behind. While muttering complaints about the original owner, Li Wei poked the horsehair brush into the clay pot to prod the General.
He tried a few times, but there was no response. A bad premonition chilled him—could it really be dead?
When he turned the cricket with the brush, that premonition hardened into a grim reality: the General was dead.
Damn it. Bitter and speechless, Li Wei tasted the sourness in his mouth but had no words to spare.
It was already afternoon; finding a cricket that could match Tai Sui before tomorrow’s God of War Conference was impossible.
The other crickets the original owner had kept were decent, but compared to Tai Sui they weren’t even close; there was no hope of victory.
What should I do? Li Wei scratched his head.
He inspected the rest anyway, and what he found shocked him.
He’d thought the General’s death might be an isolated case. It wasn’t.
Of the hundred-plus crickets on the shelves, nearly all were dead. Fewer than ten were still alive, and even those were half-dead.
What the hell happened? Li Wei frowned in confusion.
These crickets had been raised by the original owner himself—and he alone had the keys. Could this be connected to that merchant’s performance earlier? Li Wei remembered the fish scene and a cold light flashed through his eyes. If it was Yu Deshui, he’d make him pay.
But right now, tracking down the cause wasn’t the priority. Tomorrow was the issue.
Perhaps because he’d become a mage, Li Wei calmed himself quickly. After some hard thinking and meditation, an idea took shape.
He was a mage now; mages could mold anything with mana. Could he shape an artificial cricket with mana and enter it into the match?