Unlimited employment

Chapter 209, Section 208: [The Metamorphosis of the Gu Insect]

Looking at the account book on the ground, Manager Liu breathed a sigh of relief, wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and regained some composure.

Gangs are unreasonable places. If the Ministry of Justice is determined to prosecute them, they will not produce any evidence, but will instead choose to use torture to extract confessions.

Since he was given the chance to speak, he still had a chance to live.

"Boss Fang, this is a setup. Someone must be framing me."

I, Lao Liu, have worked in the business for twenty years. I've always been honest and upright, and I've never dared to take even a penny more than I should have.

I have two sons and two daughters. A few years ago, they all got married one after another. Because I couldn't afford the dowry and betrothal gifts, I had to borrow a sum of money from a friend with low interest to use temporarily. Many people know about this.

You ask me, how could someone as honest and upright as me engage in such underhanded practices as keeping two sets of accounts?

To prove my innocence, I would like to ask you to reconcile the accounts in the warehouse and the treasury using two ledgers. Whether what I said is true or false will be clear in a single reconciliation!

Manager Liu picked up the account book that Chen Sheng had thrown out, his eyes reddening as he spoke, his heart filled with endless grievances.

Watching the other party's performance, Chen Sheng rocked his armchair and said calmly.

"Let's skip the inventory check. I believe that with Manager Liu's abilities, not a single tael of silver in the business should be missing, and there shouldn't be any problems with the goods in the warehouse."

Upon hearing this, Manager Liu's heart tightened, and then Chen Sheng, with his eyes closed, continued.

"Old Liu, you're a smart man."

In recent years, the wars fought by our Great Ming have caused the price of cloth to rise year after year. You thought it was profitable, so you secretly bought a batch of cloth and hoarded it, planning to sell it and make a fortune when the price was even higher.

Do you think that as long as this war continues, the price of cloth will not fall, this deal will never lose money, and your use of the business's capital to make money for yourself will never be discovered?

That's quite a clever scheme.

Starting from the 20th year of the Wanli Emperor's reign, the world suddenly became quite turbulent.

At the beginning of the year, the Ningxia Campaign, in which the Mongols rebelled, took place. Before this battle was over, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who had ended the chaos of the Warring States period in Japan, brazenly invaded Korea, attempting to use the peninsula as a springboard to invade the Ming Dynasty.

After more than half a year of fighting, the Ming Dynasty finally managed to quell the Mongol rebellion. However, the Three Kingdoms War fought on Korean soil had been going on and on for several years without any resolution.

Two consecutive major battles caused the prices of various goods related to war and cultivation to skyrocket in the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, the emperor issued an edict ordering local gentry and wealthy individuals to donate money and goods to repay the emperor's kindness.

As one of the largest gangs in the country, the Canal Gang was assigned the task of procuring various supplies for the Korean War.

Among them, the Linqing Canal Gang was responsible for purchasing fabric and sewing cotton-padded clothes.

The fact that the Ministry of Justice has visited the cloth shop today clearly indicates that they have uncovered a major corrupt official.

At this moment, the shop was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Manager Liu broke out in a cold sweat again, opened his mouth, and said in a hoarse voice.

"Brother Fang is joking. You say I embezzled money from the business to make money, but not a single penny of money in the treasury is missing."

If you don't believe me, you can take the ledger and check the accounts yourself.

As for the batch of goods I bought through connections, it was just that my wife's relatives wanted to do business and asked me to find some connections.

This misunderstanding likely arose because your subordinates failed to investigate properly.

Upon hearing this explanation, Chen Sheng laughed.

"Old Liu, do you really think you managed to pawn the cloth shop's boat and land in Liaocheng and borrow ten thousand taels of silver without anyone knowing?"

The next moment, the shop's door was pushed open from the outside.

Two thugs dragged a man covered in blood into the room and threw him at the feet of Manager Liu, who was sweating profusely.

Ho ho ho——

With a labored gasp, the man opened his eyes and, upon seeing Manager Liu, cried out in delight, like a drowning man grasping at a straw.

"It was him, he's the one who borrowed the money from our bank."

The shop, house, and six boats in this bustling area of ​​Linqing were used as collateral to borrow 10,000 taels of silver, with a monthly interest of 1,000 taels. The principal and interest must be repaid within six months, or the collateral will be taken away.

"You son of a bitch, you dare to touch the Canal Gang's businesses! You've really ruined us!"

In his excitement, the man climbed up, trying to bite Manager Liu, but was dragged away by the henchmen.

Seeing that his scheme had been exposed, Manager Liu could no longer hold on. His legs buckled and he knelt on the ground, panting heavily as he spoke to Chen Sheng.

"I, Liu Gen, have worked diligently and conscientiously my whole life, always loyal to the gang, but I ended up like this because of a moment of greed. It is truly my own fault."

But we members of the Canal Gang have always been men of courage and responsibility. I am willing to accept punishment according to the gang rules, to have my kneecaps removed, and to be expelled from the gang.

As he spoke, he pulled a dagger from his pocket and, under the pitying gazes of the men around him, gritted his teeth and gouged out two bloody pieces of bone from his knees.

After a long while, Manager Liu held the two pieces of kneecap in his hands and smiled tremblingly at Chen Sheng.

"Boss Fang, can I leave now?"

But as he lay there, pale-faced, he saw Chen Sheng clapping his hands.

"Now that the first thing is done, let's talk about the second thing."

As soon as the applause subsided, another group of henchmen carried in an old-fashioned box covered in damp soil.

Upon seeing the box, Manager Liu's pale face turned deathly ashen. He watched as the box opened, revealing ingots of grayish silver. His lips trembled, but he couldn't utter a single word.

"As far as I know, this is not the first time you have mortgaged the cloth shop's house and boat."

The same trick was used once before, in the eleventh year of the Wanli Emperor's reign, when our Great Ming Dynasty went to war with Burma, and we made quite a bit of money from it.

According to the gang rules, anyone who embezzles funds in this way will have their kneecaps removed the first time, and the second time, the Ministry of Justice will throw them into the river to feed the fish!

"Why are you forcing me? I've already conceded a step, why are you still pushing me?"

Seeing that his plan had been exposed, a resolute look flashed in Manager Liu's eyes as his life was about to be in danger. He suddenly sprang up, slapped his hands on the ground, and charged towards Chen Sheng.

Right now, the entire cloth shop is surrounded by the Ministry of Justice's men. The only way to escape is to capture Chen Sheng, their leader.

How much ability could a young second-in-command of the Ministry of Justice, who rose to power in his early twenties by virtue of the gang leader's trust and his reputation for ruthlessness, possibly have?
Even if he loses his kneecap, his opponent will never be a match for him.

boom!
Manager Liu pounced like a tiger released from its cage. His pure blood and energy, cultivated for over forty years, filled his palms, instantly doubling in size. His fingernails snapped out and locked onto Chen Sheng's throat.

Scorching heat emanated from every pore of his body, surging through the hall, and the gusts of hot air even blew away several of the henchmen around him.

Seeing his giant hand already pressing against Chen Sheng's face, he was overjoyed and couldn't help but roar.

"caught you!"

What are you yelling about?

Chen Sheng's voice froze Manager Liu's smile. The surging, fiery energy emanating from Chen Sheng's body prevented the mere inch of distance between them from shortening.

"How can this be?"

In the next instant, Ru Yan's blood and qi surged and condensed into a huge handprint, which directly grabbed Manager Liu's body.

With a gentle pinch, his body was frozen in mid-air, unable to move, and his internal energy and blood scattered and wandered uncontrollably.

The fact that he was captured instead of the person he was trying to capture left Manager Liu in a state of panic. He didn't have time to be shocked by the other party's superb martial arts skills and immediately spoke up.

"Fang Yuan, do you know that my methods of making money are not sophisticated? Why has the Ministry of Justice never investigated this before?"
That's because I have connections.

"Let me go, and this matter can be resolved peacefully. If you insist on killing me, you will find it impossible to get along with the Canal Gang in the future!"

"Does Manager Liu mean Elder Li because he has connections in higher positions?"

You probably don't know this, but this morning, just before I set off to arrest you, he was already beaten to death by the gang leader for some other crime.

"What? This is impossible!"

Chen Sheng lay on the rocking chair, ignoring Liu's words. He simply reached into Liu's stomach, and after a moment of searching, pulled out a long, snake-like Gu worm from the surface of the liver.

When it left its host, the Gu worm was still wriggling and struggling, trying to bite his finger.

But as soon as Chen Sheng grabbed it tightly, he instantly completed the refining process, and the Gu worm immediately turned into a well-behaved baby.

Green Wood Gu: A first-tier Gu worm that parasitizes the host's body and can grant the host an extremely slow ability to regenerate and repair deficiencies.

It was because of this that Manager Liu dared to harm himself without hesitation.

"Finally got it."

Having accomplished his main objective, Chen Sheng casually tossed Manager Liu aside, got up from the rocking chair, and turned to leave.

His henchmen immediately took over the prisoner, carried the silver box, and followed him away in single file.

When only a dozen or so staff members remained in the hall, they looked at each other for a long time, then ran outside to confirm that all the people from the Ministry of Justice had left before they began to discuss among themselves.

"Who was that just now? They possessed such unfathomable martial arts skills."

"You don't even know this? That's Fang Yuan, the big boss. He became the second-in-command of the Ministry of Justice in his early twenties."

"Judging from the powerful aura he just displayed, this person is likely to break through to the True Qi Realm at any time. Once he successfully breaks through, he will automatically be promoted to Elder."

"An elder so young, it's unbelievable!"

"Manager Liu is really unlucky to have fallen into the hands of someone like this."

"If you ask me, this is all karma. Who told him to always deduct our wages?"

"A true man should be like this. I wish I had Boss Fang's skills."

"Someone like you, who was among the first to be eliminated from the orphanage, wants to be the leader? You should take a good look at yourself."

……

Outside the cloth shop, Chen Sheng sat in a four-person iron sedan chair made of blue steel.

This type of sedan chair was a special means of transportation for the high-ranking members of the Linqing canal gang. It was not only private enough but also very safe, making it very suitable for getting around in the city's alleyways where there was a lot of traffic.

In the sedan chair.

Chen Sheng repeatedly used his qi and blood to cleanse the Gu worm in his hand, then unbuttoned his clothes, placed the small snake on his lower abdomen, and let it pierce through his flesh and parasitize the surface of his liver. He then let out a long sigh of relief.

"After searching for so many years, I have finally gathered the complete set of Gu worms used to enhance the body."

In the three years since his reincarnation, Chen Sheng has been exploring the mysteries of the Gu worm in the fruit while diligently cultivating himself.

Even now, although he has only cultivated the Dao of Destiny to the peak of the first level in order not to be too shocking, and because he needs to cultivate seventy-two kinds of Dao techniques at the same time, the speed of his cultivation of the Dao of Sexuality has only reached the peak of the second level.

But his demonstrated Refinement Realm cultivation level was enough for him to gain a foothold in the Linqing Canal Gang.

After Xingdao advanced to the second tier, he combined the Tightening Curse with the Nightmare Prayer Technique, secretly controlling many key figures in the Canal Gang. Now he can even secretly control most of the gang's affairs.

The reason why Elder Li, the patron of Manager Liu, died was because he secretly used methods to deliberately mislead the gang leader into making a wrong judgment.

Unfortunately, the gang leader is a third-level Qi Refining cultivator, and it is still difficult for Chen Sheng to take him down quietly.

Therefore, he planned to wait patiently for a period of time until he made another breakthrough in his cultivation, and then take control of the entire Cao Gang as a means to explore this fruit.

In addition to his cultivation over the past few years, he has also made some progress in the art of Gu poison.

The summoning panel popped up in front of me.

[Career 2]: Parasitic Gu Dao (Development Stage)

Level: Lv9 (998/9000)

Talents: Body capable of cultivating Gu (a type of poison), Body capable of controlling Gu (another type of poison)

Gu worms: Blood Fetus Gu, Disguise Gu, Mighty Gu, Gluttony Gu, Insight Gu, Scent Gu, Strong Testis Gu, Giant Bull Gu... (a total of twenty-seven types)
The Gu Body: Gu is the essence of heaven and earth. In the cruel battles and devouring, Gu worms can absorb other fragments of the essence of heaven and earth and transform into worms of higher quality.

This talent allows the host's body to be used as a vessel for refining Gu worms. When the Gu worms devour each other within the body, the success rate of transformation can be greatly increased.

Based on Chen Sheng's limited understanding of the Gu worms in this world over the years, Gu worms with similar innate abilities or in sets seem to be more likely to complete this transformation.

He happened to have a complete set of Gu worms.

The sedan chair, forged from steel, is moving through the streets and alleys of Linqing.

Since entering Chen Sheng's body, the Green Wood Gu has instinctively begun to absorb the vital energy in his Yin Spirit.

In no time, its body grew larger, successfully advancing to the second tier.

From that moment on, Chen Sheng's entire body suddenly lit up.

Eyes, ears, nose, tongue, throat, heart, lungs, liver, bones, stomach, intestines, hair, horns, flesh, skin... every part of the body is inhabited by various kinds of Gu worms, emitting a hazy light that penetrates the body.

Then, under the influence of his innate [Gu Gu Body], these worms lurking in various parts of Chen Sheng's body detached from their parasitic organs and rushed towards his abdomen like madmen.

Using his body as a battlefield, a brutal fight broke out.

Every moment, Gu worms die and are swallowed by the victors of local battles, only to become new losers in the blink of an eye, becoming food for others.

When Chen Sheng's sedan chair traveled through Linqing City for the time it takes for an incense stick to burn before stopping at the entrance of the Canal Gang, all the dozens of Gu worms in his abdomen had disappeared.

After a round of mutual devouring, the victorious mantis-shaped Gu worm secreted a large amount of mucus from its body and transformed into a brand new Gu egg.

(End of this chapter)