One person: I, Daoist Master, am a cultivator of immortality!

Sun Yao also felt it was unwise to linger here; after all, everyone is equal before firearms. The garrison commander of this Sand City was armed, and he needed to maintain a certain level of respect for firearms. However, before leaving, he still had to thoroughly search the corpse—a good habit he'd developed many of his methods through this approach.

After searching the lead trafficker's body, he pulled a book from his pocket. The book looked very old, probably from the Tang or Song dynasty. Without even reading it, Sun Yao put it in his pouch and left this dangerous place with Er Yuehong. Of course, the girl was taken away with them.

Led by Er Yuehong, they wandered through a maze of turns and finally arrived at a mansion. It was more of a small courtyard than a mansion. He looked around to make sure no one was watching, then knocked on the gate. A moment later, a man about his age opened the door. This man had a refined appearance and wore glasses, but his demeanor clearly indicated he was a sorcerer.

"Isn't this Young Master Hong? What brings you here? And who are these gentlemen?"

"It's urgent, so please don't tease me. Gentlemen, this is my friend Qi Huan. He makes a living by fortune-telling with his father and is a very good fortune teller. His predictions are usually quite accurate, and he's also an expert in feng shui. These two are the righteous men I met on the street just now. A group of human traffickers were carrying this girl around the streets, and these two righteous men rescued her."

After Er Yuehong introduced the two sides, the group entered Qi Huan's courtyard. Once inside, Qi Huan approached Er Yuehong and said, "Hey, Hong Guan, why are you bringing all sorts of people here? My place is too small to accommodate big shots. I just looked at these two and did a fortune telling, and good heavens, neither of them is someone I can afford to offend."

"Hey, this young man just attacked the human trafficker to save this girl. He went a bit too far and killed someone. I'm afraid he'll attract the attention of Zuo Qianzhi."

"That's troublesome. Zuo Qianzhi is the garrison commander of Shacheng. How can my little courtyard possibly stop him?"

The two men were whispering to each other, unaware that their conversation had already reached Sun Yao's ears. Sun Yao shook his head and stood up from the table in the courtyard. "Don't worry, he's just a mere garrison commander of Shacheng. I'm not afraid of him. But keeping him around all the time could really cause trouble, since I've heard that Zuo Qianzhi isn't a good person."

The two people who had been whispering nearby turned to look at Sun Yao after hearing his words, both with expressions of disbelief. Clearly, they couldn't believe that Sun Yao could hear their whispers from so far away.

“This Zuo Qianzhi is indeed not a good person, but he is at least a proper defense officer of Shacheng, and he has hundreds of guns at his disposal. I know you are incredibly powerful, but mortal flesh and blood can't withstand firearms after all.” Er Yuehong quickly realized what was going on, walked over to Sun Yao’s side, and patted him on the shoulder.

"Why would I need to deal with him? Miss Hong, send a message to the foreman and ask him if he would be willing to be the garrison commander of Shacheng. Oh, no, I mean, if he would be willing to be the governor-general of Huguang."

"Governor-General of Huguang? But isn't that position currently held by the Duan family? The Duan family, father and son, commands a large army, and a large number of them are newly formed, with extraordinary combat capabilities. This position of Governor-General of Huguang isn't something you can just sit on and do. Daoist, what makes you so confident?"

Hong Guniang was also taken aback when she heard this. The Governor-General of Huguang was an extremely high position. Currently, there were eight governors-general in the country, who controlled almost all the military power. These eight warlords had basically divided the entire country.

"We have some chance of success, it just depends on how ambitious the Duan family father and son are. There's been a change in the Governor-General of Zhili, and the Duan family father and son also want to go to Zhili to serve as Governor-General. But they don't want to give up the Governor-General of Huguang. But if they don't take their troops with them, who will take them seriously in Zhili? But if they do take their troops, Huguang will definitely be occupied by others. If they can't take Zhili then, and they lose Huguang, what will become of them, like stray dogs?"

"You mean..."

"That's right. Chen Yulou commands 10 Xieling warriors, and the Xieling family is wealthy. If they use the money to buy new equipment from abroad to equip these Xieling warriors and turn them into a new army, Chen Yulou will become the most formidable force in Huguang. We only need to cooperate with the Duan family, and they will definitely choose us as their ally to become the governor of Huguang. After all, once they leave, no matter who becomes the governor of Huguang, Chen Yulou has the ability to kill them and take the position himself. So they might as well give Chen Yulou some goodwill."

Upon hearing Sun Yao's words, Hong Guniang's eyes gleamed. Yes, how come no one in the entire Xieling clan had thought of this? Xieling had men and money; men could be recruited as soldiers, and money could be used to buy guns. Then they would control the largest gun barrels in the Huguang region. If they claimed to be a regular army, who would dare call them bandits?

"Young man, even if what you say is true, that's a matter for the future. A distant solution can't address an immediate problem. What we're discussing now is how to get rid of Zuo Qianzhi, this troublesome individual, in the shortest possible time."

After overhearing Sun Yao and Hong Guniang's conversation, Er Yuehong gave Hong Guniang a strange look. She recognized the name Hong Guniang; she was one of Chen Yulou's right-hand women, the leader of the Xieling sect. After all, they all made their living from the soil, and these southern-style tomb raiders needed to know something about the regular tomb raiding army, so they could forge a good relationship if they encountered them in the future. Especially the Xieling sect—their 100,000 members were a veritable band of outlaws; which tomb raider would dare offend them?

"Zuo Qianzhi? I've never considered him a threat, so why bring up things like 'distant waters and nearby fires'? Hong Guan probably doesn't understand us Extraordinary People very well. For us, firearms are no longer a means of threatening us. In fact, for Extraordinary People at our level, firearms are no longer a means of endangering our lives. Perhaps lower-level firearms are still useful, but for higher-level people, firearms are at most icing on the cake, serving no other purpose."

As Sun Yao spoke, he took a step forward, and the next second he disappeared from Er Yuehong's side and appeared next to Qi Huan. This was his ability to shrink the distance between people.