I Can Upgrade Everything Infinitely-Chapter 46 - 45: The Ghostly Figure in White

Time flew by.

In the blink of an eye.

Ten o’clock at night.

Xu Qing had finished his patrol. His shift today ran from two in the afternoon to ten at night, and the patrol had been uneventful.

At this moment.

Xu Qing had already returned to his residence.

RUSTLE RUSTLE...

The Cabbage Flower Snake slithered out from a corner, its two-and-a-half-meter-long body winding along.

"Brother Xu."

Before long.

Yu Chen arrived. He and Yu Hu were pushing a large flatbed cart piled with one hundred jin of meat, which had cost a full one hundred taels of silver.

One jin of meat cost one tael of silver.

You have to understand.

In these times, grain was already scarce. Many refugees and disaster victims outside the city were on the brink of starvation. Naturally, the price of food like meat was soaring; one jin of meat now cost a tael of silver.

One could say.

The price had increased tenfold.

"Mm."

Xu Qing glanced over. "Push it in."

"Alrighty."

Yu Chen nodded. He and Yu Hu quickly pushed the flatbed cart into the courtyard. Wiping the sweat from his forehead, he said, "Brother Xu, here’s the one hundred jin of pork you wanted."

"Go ahead and check it."

"Alright."

Xu Qing lifted the gray cloth covering the meat and took a look. It was indeed one hundred jin of pork. Although it wasn’t the freshest, there were no problems with it.

"No problem," Xu Qing said.

"How much silver?" Xu Qing asked.

"One hundred taels," Yu Chen said.

"Okay."

Xu Qing took out a one-hundred-tael silver note and an additional ten taels of silver. "This is one hundred and ten taels of silver. Consider the extra ten taels a service fee."

"No, no, that’s not necessary."

Yu Chen waved his hands, accepting only the hundred taels. "Brother Xu, you’re Hu Zi’s master. How could we possibly accept a service fee for helping you?"

"Just take it," Xu Qing said.

"This..."

Seeing the look in Xu Qing’s eyes, Yu Chen nodded. "Thank you, Brother Xu. Hu Zi, what are you waiting for? Thank your master."

"Thank you, Master."

Yu Hu bowed deeply.

"It’s getting late. You two should head back," Xu Qing said.

"Understood."

"We’ll take our leave."

Yu Chen and Yu Hu nodded. They left, closing the courtyard gate behind them. The only ones left in the courtyard were Xu Qing and the Cabbage Flower Snake.

"This meat is all for you."

Xu Qing pointed at the one hundred jin of pork on the flatbed cart and said to the Cabbage Flower Snake, "Eat your fill. Eat as much as you can. Finish these hundred jin of pork as quickly as possible."

"HISS..."

The Cabbage Flower Snake flicked its tongue excitedly, slowly slithered onto the flatbed cart, and began to gulp down a large piece of meat.

However.

The Cabbage Flower Snake was, after all, an ordinary snake with an average digestive system. It would likely take many days to finish all one hundred jin of pork.

"We’ll have to take it slow," Xu Qing mused, watching the Cabbage Flower Snake on the cart. "Thankfully, it’s winter, and the weather is cold. This pork won’t spoil easily even if it’s left out for a while."

The night passed without a word.

「The next day.」

Xu Qing woke up early, ate one jin of Black Mountain Tiger Meat, and went outside the city to begin his patrol shift. Since congee was being distributed in the morning, Xu Qing saw Jiang Feiying again.

...

Xu Qing did his best not to look around, remaining steadfast at his post.

Time flew by.

Finally, Jiang Feiying finished distributing the congee. As usual, she prepared to leave the stall, but she stopped as she passed by Xu Qing.

Xu Qing’s body tensed slightly.

"Miss, what is it?"

Jiang Feiying’s handmaiden, Zilan, asked.

"It’s nothing."

Jiang Feiying shook her head. She looked at Xu Qing, her stunningly beautiful face still wearing that warm, sweet smile. "Hello, have we met somewhere before?"

"Well..."

Xu Qing lowered his head slightly and said, "Miss Jiang, I am just an ordinary apprentice from a Martial Arts Hall. How could you have possibly met me? You must have mistaken me for someone else."

"Is that so?"

Jiang Feiying looked skeptical and asked again, "What is your name?"

"Xu Qing," Xu Qing replied.

"And which Martial Arts Hall do you train at?" Jiang Feiying asked again.

"Cangying Martial Arts Hall," Xu Qing said.

"Then perhaps I really am mistaken," Jiang Feiying said with a slightly apologetic expression.

"It is my honor," Xu Qing said.

...

Xu Qing raised his head, silently watching Jiang Feiying’s retreating figure.

’Have I been targeted?’

Xu Qing’s expression grew slightly grim.

Just now, his instincts had put him on high alert, and the Evil Ghost Mask in his robes had reacted violently. Something was very wrong with the young miss of the Jiang Family standing before him.

HUU...

Xu Qing took a deep breath and murmured softly, "I just want to be a nobody, to stop getting involved in other people’s business."

"But in the end..."

"I’ve been targeted anyway."

「Two in the afternoon.」

His patrol shift for the day was over.

Xu Qing returned to his residence.

Inside the house.

In one of the rooms.

Xu Qing had placed the one hundred jin of pork and the Cabbage Flower Snake in the room. Every day, the snake would eat pork until it was stuffed, then move around constantly, doing its best to digest the meat.

Today, the Cabbage Flower Snake had eaten ten jin of pork.

[Cabbage Flower Snake Level 1: 1/10.]

"I can only take this slow," Xu Qing said.

In the courtyard.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Xu Qing was practicing his Baji Fist. Although his patrol duties had cut his daily martial arts training time by more than half, he still practiced Baji Fist every day without fail.

...

[Experience +1]

...

[Experience +1]

...

Before he knew it, the sky had completely darkened.

It was getting late.

It was already around ten o’clock at night.

HUU...

Xu Qing stopped, exhaling a turbid breath. He glanced at the dark sky, then returned to his bedroom and put on the Evil Ghost Mask.

Slowly, Xu Qing seemed to fall asleep.

BUZZ! BUZZ! BUZZ!

Suddenly.

In the courtyard.

Wisps of Yin Qi began to spread, and a sinister aura appeared from an unknown source. A deathly-white phantom entered Xu Qing’s residence.

SWOOSH!

Instantly, the phantom, feet not touching the ground, with disheveled hair and a long white robe, passed straight through the wall and into Xu Qing’s bedroom.

HISS HISS...

The Cabbage Flower Snake had clearly sensed something. It slithered about restlessly inside its room, but with the door and windows closed, it couldn’t get out.

In the bedroom.

The phantom had already entered and was now floating beside Xu Qing’s bed. Its long, black hair flew about like a swarm of giant black pythons, coiling endlessly in the air.

WHOOSH! WHOOSH! WHOOSH!!!

In an instant, the strands of black hair shot out like black spears, aiming to pierce Xu Qing’s head as he lay in bed.

"JIE JIE JIE..."

Suddenly, a sinister, sharp laugh echoed.

From a corner of the bedroom, the hidden Witch Evil Ghost revealed itself. It swiftly extended its skeletal, aged right hand, which swelled in size as it moved, transforming into a gigantic ghostly claw in the blink of an eye.

CRACK! CRACK!

In just a few swift motions, the Witch Evil Ghost tore the white-robed phantom’s hair to shreds.

"Die!"

BOOM!

Xu Qing’s eyes snapped open. A powerful force erupted from him as he leaped from the bed. His Qi and Blood surged, and his Dan Jin exploded forth.

"Baji Fist! Boom!" 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

BANG!

Xu Qing charged in front of the white-robed phantom. With another furious roar, he threw a punch with his right fist. His Dan Jin and Qi and Blood erupted, and he obliterated the phantom with a single blow.

"AHH!!"

The white-robed phantom burst apart, exploding into a cloud of ghostly mist. In the end, only a single black hair was left, drifting gently down from the air.

Afterward, that single strand of black hair also dissipated.

HUU...

Xu Qing took a deep breath, now fully awake.

He knew. Earlier that day, Xu Qing had a faint feeling that he was being targeted by Jiang Feiying. That was why he had released the Witch Evil Ghost beforehand when he went to sleep that night.

As expected, a white-robed phantom like this had truly appeared tonight.

If the Witch Evil Ghost hadn’t been standing guard, and if Xu Qing had truly been asleep, he might very well have fallen into the trap. The white-robed phantom came and went without a trace, making it difficult to detect.

Time flew by.

In the blink of an eye.

「Seven days later.」

Ever since the appearance of the white-robed phantom, Xu Qing was surprisingly never attacked again. It was unexpected, but he didn’t dare let his guard down, having the Witch Evil Ghost watch over him every night as he slept.

Ten o’clock at night.

Xu Qing arrived outside the city. Today was his tenth day on patrol duty. His shift was from ten at night until six the next morning.

Furthermore, ever since the strange incident seven or eight days ago, which cost the patrol team three members, the other guards no longer dared to have any funny ideas.

So, nothing had happened these past few days. All in all, everything was safe and sound.

"Brother Xu."

Liu Xiao said to Xu Qing as they walked their patrol route, "So many days have passed, but the number of refugees and disaster victims outside the city hasn’t decreased. In fact, it’s only grown."

"Indeed," Xu Qing nodded.

He knew. When Xu Qing had first started his patrols, there were about forty thousand refugees and disaster victims outside the city. Now, only about ten days later, that number had swelled to around sixty thousand.

An increase of a full fifty percent.

Most importantly, the amount of congee being distributed by the Three Great Families and the Government Office was decreasing, and the congee itself was getting thinner. The refugees and disaster victims outside the city had noticed.

"This can’t go on."

Su Changhe shook his head. He looked at the surrounding refugees and disaster victims and mused, "With so many of them gathered here, if things go wrong, it could lead to a catastrophe."

Before they knew it, it was already midnight.

BUZZ! BUZZ!

Suddenly, Xu Qing’s gaze sharpened as he looked at the refugees and disaster victims lying on the ground around them. They were suddenly, unsteadily, getting to their feet.

One, two, three...

More and more.

In the blink of an eye, nearly two-thirds of the disaster victims in the area Xu Qing was patrolling had inexplicably risen to their feet. Their eyes were vacant, like living corpses.

"What?!"

"What are you doing?"

"All of you, lie back down and go to sleep!"

...

The pupils of Liu Xiao and Su Changhe contracted as they roared furiously.