Late at night, a black sedan drove slowly along the wide streets of Yun Port City’s affluent district.
The area was brightly lit. Even though night had fallen, most of the shops lining the street still had their signs lit, and pedestrians or rickshaws occasionally passed by.
Lu Yun sat in the back of the sedan, while Lin Fengjiu, in the front passenger seat, watched with rapt attention.
About ten paces ahead of the car, Wen Sheng moved like a soulless marionette.
His eyes stared blankly forward. With outstretched arms and a stiff posture, he pulled at a Kongming Lantern suspended in mid-air.
The lantern was not made of ordinary bamboo paper. Its shade was covered in dense script drawn with cinnabar, and its body barely swayed, pointing in a single, clear direction.
Qiucai followed close behind Wen Sheng, vigilantly watching their surroundings while periodically waving away curious onlookers who had stopped to stare and point.
"Hey! What in the world are you two up to? It’s the middle of the night and you’re out here pretending to be ghosts leading some lantern?"
A middle-aged man on his way home late frowned and spat on the ground. "Ptooey! What bad luck!"
"Yeah, seriously. It’s creepy. Have they gone crazy or something?" a young man in a suit, arm in arm with his female companion, whispered in agreement before pulling her away to hurry past them.
Qiucai heard their undisguised contempt and disdain, and his face burned with embarrassment. He wished the ground would open up and swallow him whole.
’This job is humiliating enough, and now I have to be stared at like a zoo animal...’
The next moment, perhaps because his pent-up shame and anger had reached its peak, Qiucai whipped his head around, glared at the loudest of the onlookers, and roared back.
"What are you looking at? It’s none of your damn business! Watch where you’re going, or you’ll get run over by a car while you’re gawking!"
His shout was sudden and carried a frightening, crazed energy.
The onlookers were startled. The sneers on their faces froze, and they quickly lowered their heads and hurried away, not daring to spare another glance.
As the saying goes: the bully fears the blockhead, the blockhead fears the daredevil, and the daredevil fears the madman.
After his outburst, Qiucai was immediately hit by a wave of exhaustion and lingering fear.
He stole a glance at the sedan slowly following them, flinched, and quickly hurried to catch up with his junior brother, Wen Sheng, who continued his mechanical advance.
Only now, his gestures to drive away onlookers were rougher, and his glare was far more "vicious."
The effect was immediate. Wherever the two of them went, pedestrians quickly moved aside to clear a path.
Over an hour later, Qiucai was drenched in sweat. Large beads of it rolled down his cheeks and neck, completely soaking the back of his coarse-spun shirt.
He was so tired his tongue was hanging out, and he could barely straighten his back. He was practically bent in half, and still had to use one hand to steady Wen Sheng, who continued his stiff, vacant-eyed march.
"Master... I... I really can’t take it anymore... My legs feel like they’re going to break..." Qiucai gasped, crying out in a desperate wail toward the passenger window of the black sedan, which had been following them at a snail’s pace.
Lin Fengjiu’s face, stern with a hint of resignation, appeared in the window. He snorted, his voice laced with disappointment. "So now you feel the strain? I tell you to temper your body and train hard, but my words always go in one ear and out the other!"
"You’ve walked such a short distance and you’re already crying life and death. At this rate, I’m afraid my humble skills will be lost forever, with no one to inherit them!"
Though cultivators borrow the Power of Heaven and Earth to perform profound Techniques, their own physical constitution is fundamental.
A strong and healthy body, with vigorous qi and blood, can hold more Spiritual Power, allowing one to cast Techniques with greater stability and endurance.
Lin Fengjiu understood this principle well and frequently urged his two disciples to temper their bodies, but to little effect.
Scolded into silence, Qiucai could only wear a pained expression, grit his teeth, and continue helping Wen Sheng forward.
Thankfully, after another half hour or so, Wen Sheng’s mechanical pace finally slowed to a halt.
The Kongming Lantern he was guiding with both hands stopped drifting forward and hovered silently in place.
The lantern’s flame flickered slightly, pointing toward a high-walled villa ahead, from which only a few lights shone.
The location was still within the affluent district in the city center, only about ten kilometers from the Ren Family’s villa.
The journey had taken so long entirely because Wen Sheng, under the guidance of the Technique, moved at a walking pace, slowing everyone down.
The car stopped. Ren Facai leaned out of the driver’s seat to look. When he made out the villa’s silhouette and house number, his face turned livid.
An irrepressible wave of anger surged through him. Ren Facai slammed his fist on the steering wheel and ground out, "Uncle Nine! Are you absolutely sure this is the place?"
"This... this is that animal Fu Jinmin’s place!"
"Yes, this is it." Lin Fengjiu pushed open the car door and got out cleanly.
Ren Facai also got out quickly, then walked around to the rear to respectfully open the door for Lu Yun.
Lu Yun stepped out of the car and looked up at the villa before them.
Wen Sheng remained frozen in place, while Qiucai had collapsed onto the ground, panting heavily.
Lin Fengjiu walked over to Wen Sheng and lightly tapped a pressure point on his shoulder.
Wen Sheng shuddered. The vacant look in his eyes slowly cleared. He glanced around, then down at the lantern in his hands, looking completely bewildered. "Ma-Master? Are... are we there?"
"We’re here," Lin Fengjiu replied curtly, taking the Kongming Lantern from his hands.
Nearby, when Lu Yun heard the name "Fu Jinmin," another face with a nearly identical name instantly surfaced in his mind.
Fu Jinqian!
Lu Yun had long marked him as an enemy to be eliminated. His original plan was to wait until his own power had stabilized at a higher level, then find an opportunity to settle the score with that beast who was a plague upon the nation.
He never expected that before he could settle his old scores, the Fu Family would make a move against the Ren Family, a family so closely connected to him!
And Fu Jinmin was Fu Jinqian’s full-blooded younger brother, and by no means a good person himself.
He operated the Da Guanxi Daily in Yun Port City, serving as its chairman.
In the newspaper world of Yun Port City, the three acknowledged titans were the well-connected *Yun Port Daily*, the Lu Family-backed *Starfire Daily*, and the more radical *Liaoyuan Daily*.
The *Da Guanxi Daily*, on the other hand, had always been a second-rate paper, barely surviving by relying on the underworld influence of Fu Jinmin’s brother and other unsavory tactics.
It often published inflammatory articles to whitewash the Fu Family’s business dealings.
Ever since arriving in this turbulent and precarious era, Lu Yun had come to understand one truth more profoundly than anyone.
Sometimes, the destructive power and influence of a certain force could be even more terrifying than airplanes and cannons.
And that was control of the narrative!
Therefore, as soon as the Lu Family’s import-export business had found its footing, Lu Yun began to lay his plans.
He saw potential in his cousin-nephew, Ren Facai, who was knowledgeable, worldly, and knew how to be flexible.
He invested significant financial resources and personal connections to hoist the banner of the *Starfire Daily* in the battleground of public opinion in Yun Port City.
It was no exaggeration to say that without Lu Yun’s support and protection, in the cutthroat newspaper world of Yun Port City—a tangled web of competing factions—the *Starfire Daily* would have long been devoured, bones and all, by the ravenous wolves.
Let alone grow to its current size, where it could stand as a rival to the *Yun Port Daily*.

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