I want to die!

Chapter 13 Inheritance

Zhang Dakang struggled desperately, his veins bulging, and he barely managed to resist the downward-pressing hand with all his might.

But what made him uneasy was that Zhou Xing's gaze didn't fall on him at all.

Those eyes looked past him, towards the old shack on the street corner, and towards the small courtyards in the alleys on both sides where the lights had just been turned off.

"Remember this, Big Basket, the person who killed you was..." Zhou Xing cleared his throat and shouted:

"Hanako-bu, the black sheep, the mother who gave birth to the refugees..."

"Li Xuanqing, the righteous bandit who robbed grain!"

With each long title uttered and each breath taken, the strength in his palms seemed to increase even further.

He tightened his grip, and the bones in Zhang Dakuang made a grinding sound that made your teeth ache.

From the dark courtyards on either side, there seemed to be very faint, suppressed gasps. Zhou Xing's power surged again.

Zhang Dakuang finally couldn't hold on any longer and was forced to his knees, his knees sinking into the snow, his bones making a cracking sound as he struggled to bear the weight.

He looked up in alarm.

The sky was dim, and snow fell from the heavens, as if all the snow in the world was rushing towards him.

A fist, not particularly large, blocked the falling snowflakes from the sky and rapidly expanded in the field of vision.

boom!

The sounds of bones breaking and twisting rang out clearly.

Zhang Dakuang fell into a pool of blood and remained motionless.

........................

Li Xuanqing was indeed just a sixteen-year-old underage martial arts student.

Compared to someone like Zhang Dakuang, who climbed his way up to the position of manager of a beggar's hut through trials and tribulations, he couldn't compare in terms of status within the beggar's profession.

"But what does that have to do with me, 'exhibitionist' Stephen Chow?"

Zhou Xing sneered.

He stood there catching his breath for a moment, then quickly put his cotton coat back on and walked step by step toward the town.

However, his injuries were quite severe. Zhang Dakuang had used his full strength, and he had multiple fractures. Blood quickly soaked through his cotton-padded clothes, and he could only walk a few steps before leaning against the roadside, panting.

The wooden door of the shack next to him creaked open, and several people inside looked at him warily.

"Little Greenhead?" "My benefactor, do you remember me?"

Several people emerged from the doorway and surrounded Zhou Xing.

That day was extremely urgent; the grain was distributed among hundreds of people. Zhou Xing couldn't possibly remember all those faces... but he could still guess.

He glanced at Zhang Dakuang's corpse beside him and thought to himself that this should not be a coincidence.

"My benefactor, do you want to go home? Back to Baxiang Town?" a thin old man asked.

"...Do you know my home is in Baxiang Town?"

"The news has been circulating throughout the county for the past few days; everyone knows about it."

The skinny old man bent down, gesturing for Zhou Xing to climb onto his back.

"We dare not get involved in this commotion outside..."

"But if it's carrying someone on my back, I'd still have the guts..."

............

The thin old man's back was rough, but his steps were steady in the snow.

Several other figures protected them from the front and back, making their way towards Baxiang Town with uneven steps.

Several people took turns carrying him along the way, but Zhou Xing couldn't remember exactly how many times he had been carried. The massive blood loss was causing the body's vitality to vanish rapidly.

"I searched high and low without finding it, but it came to me without any effort..." Zhou Xing had really messed up; now he figured this body probably wouldn't survive the snowy night.

The night was so dark that it seemed impossible to see through, with only a faint, bleak light reflecting off the snow.

As I approached my doorstep, a lantern appeared indistinctly ahead, its warm yellow glow swaying uncertainly in the wind and snow.

Behind the lantern was a fat man wrapped in a thick cotton robe and wearing a warm hat, followed by several burly guards.

"What bad luck to run into a bunch of beggars in the middle of the night." The fat man covered his mouth and nose and told the group to walk around them at a distance.

The skinny old man and the others instinctively shrank to the side, making way for them.

It was the middle of the night, and I couldn't recognize who the other person was, but judging from their clothes, they were either a local gentry or a wealthy household. I dared not provoke them.

As they passed each other from a distance, Zhou Xing vaguely felt that the fat man leading the group looked somewhat familiar.

After thinking about it for a while, I realized that this person seemed to be... the steward of Zhao Shanren, a wealthy man in the town.

By this time, the Zhao family steward's entourage had already gone far away and disappeared into the vast snowy night.

Why would he come out from the direction of the Li family at this hour?

Zhou Xing's mind raced. That's it! The granary case had happened, and for some reason, news about him was spreading incredibly fast, growing like wildfire, and it seemed to be almost common knowledge.

The news that he, the "grain robber," had taken dozens of taels of silver and been arrested and imprisoned had probably already spread.

Zhao Shanren, being a shrewd man, probably sensed something was amiss and was eager to secure and hold onto the Li family's last debt to prevent any unforeseen complications.

They must have come overnight to collect the debt.

The Li family's debts were incurred by Li Yingcai, the father, to pay for his deceased second son's eye treatment. The family's original dozens of acres of farmland had also been mortgaged long ago.

Although it is only right to pay back debts, the original owner of Li Xuanqing beat himself to death in the street just to pay off that seventy taels of debt... But if the Zhao family comes to collect the debt, it is hard to say how much of the twenty taels of silver is still in Li's mother's hands.

Just as the thought crossed my mind, we arrived at the Li family's residence.

The wooden gate of the yard was open, and several messy footprints could be seen extending outwards in the snow.

The Zhao family has indeed come.

"Little Greenhead, let's stop here and not go in." The thin, dark-skinned woman next to him tugged at her tattered cotton coat, pulling the hole behind her back, and stopped outside the fence without stepping in.

The skinny old man and the others nodded in agreement.

Zhou Xing neither tried to stop him nor went inside.

He stood quietly alone in the wind and snow outside the courtyard, his thoughts a jumble of emotions.

The original owner's dying wish was to leave behind an inheritance. Zhou Xing's soul traveled through time for six days and obtained twenty taels of silver.

Money is hard to earn and life is tough. Paying back seventy taels of silver is not something a young beggar can do in a few days... After the Zhao family came, how much grain did the Li family have left?

He was wondering, now that things have come to this, what can he leave behind?

Zhou Xing did not enter the house.

After thinking for a long time, he slowly walked towards his second uncle Li Yingjie's house next door, leaving dark bloodstains in the snow.

He had a bold idea, perhaps there was a chance to leave behind a way out that Li Xuanqing had longed for but could not obtain in his lifetime.

He banged loudly on his second uncle's door.

A moment later, the door creaked open a crack, and Li Yingjie, wrapped in a cotton-padded coat, peeked out, holding an oil lamp, his face still sleepy.

"You're covered in blood—" Li Yingjie shouted, but his expression suddenly changed.

"Wait, weren't you locked up in the county jail? Did you sneak out? What are you doing here?"

"Aren't you worried about scaring your family with all these injuries?" Zhou Xing asked.

"And I'd like to borrow something from you."

"You want me to lend you an oxcart to collect your body?" Li Yingjie frowned and stood at the door, saying irritably.

Zhou Xing paused, then shook the money pouch again, the copper coins clinking together with a dull, solid sound.

"I have money."