Chapter 68: The Disappeared Backdoor Man

Old Thief Yuan gave a dry chuckle and said, "Men of the pugilistic world should carry themselves with the dignity befitting martial artists. It's either fight or die—who has ever heard of kneeling and begging for mercy?"

"Either you arrest me right now, or get the hell out of here immediately!"

"I'm leaving right this second!" Realizing the stalemate was unbreakable, the one surnamed Feng hurriedly gathered his men and scurried away.

Only after confirming everyone had gone did Old Thief Yuan take a leisurely, deeply satisfying drag from his cigarette. "There, that settles it. Shi Qi's trunks are safe."

Ghostly Old Ye asked, perplexed, "Old Brother, what kind of game are you playing here?"

Shopkeeper Xu raised a thumb in admiration and said, "Third Master, that move was utterly brilliant! He completely saw through the human heart! Tell me, Ghostly Old Ye, would you believe me if I said that Yuan Boyang himself was right on the other end of that phone line?"

Ghostly Old Ye was still confused. "If he was right there, why didn't he answer the call?"

Shopkeeper Xu explained, "When Yuan Boyang gifted that cigarette holder to Third Master, he wasn't very old yet, right? And he hadn't yet attained the position of Chief Constable, had he?"

"That's right!" Old Thief Yuan nodded. "Back then, he was just past forty."

"That explains it!" Shopkeeper Xu continued, "People inevitably change before and after they attain official power. Back then, before he was Chief Constable, Yuan Boyang still had passion in his heart. He prioritized loyalty above all else and dealt with matters of principle before matters of facade."

"However, once he became the Chief Constable, his mindset shifted. He had to weigh every single action three times over. That cigarette holder he gave away years ago inevitably became something he least wished to see."

"Think about it. A man in his position—even if he somehow left his cell phone at home, would any of his subordinates dare to touch his phone casually? Where would decorum be if they did?"

"By having someone else answer the call, he bought himself a buffer. Had Third Master truly made any unreasonable demands, that phone would simply have remained unreachable forever."

"Third Master smashing the cigarette holder was equivalent to laying all the cards on the table. After this incident, each goes their separate way with no further entanglements whatsoever."

"With Third Master's guarantee, Yuan Boyang naturally has to show him some respect."

Shopkeeper Xu concluded, "Third Master, the moment the phone was hung up the first time, Yuan Boyang must have already found out all the details. He knew very well that the sole purpose of the Six Constables coming to see Third Master was to take away those six trunks."

"Those six trunks can at best be regarded as the private journals of the Thirty-Six Divine Constables. To the high-ranking constables at the Six Constables' headquarters, they are dispensable. The case files in their archives are far more complete than those six boxes."

"True, these divine constables' personal notes are sacred relics of the Six Constables, but their symbolic significance far outweighs their practical value. Naturally, Yuan Boyang wouldn't care too much about them."

"Trading a set of journals for peace and quiet—Yuan Boyang would definitely agree to that."

Ghostly Old Ye was left gaping in utter astonishment. "My dear mother in heaven! It turns out I've spent half a lifetime walking the pugilistic world for nothing."

"People always say that people with minds of seven exquisite orifices are terrifying. But looking at you lot, your hearts are practically honeycombs! Not only do you have eight hundred different schemes, but they're so pitch-black they practically gleam!"

"Is that any way to compliment someone?" Old Thief Yuan clapped a hand to his chest, nearly choking on a mouthful of smoke.

If I hadn't been absent at the time, I would have stood up and applauded Ghostly Old Ye enthusiastically. What he said was just too damn spot on.

Old Thief Yuan leisurely picked up the sound-transmission talisman. "All right, you guys keep drinking and chatting. I need to make a quick call to Er Gouzi before he gets impatient and charges back over here."

Back then, I was indeed pacing back and forth in a frenzy, right on the verge of losing my composure completely.

Judging from the tone of the people speaking through the phone, I had already deduced that they must be government officials. If Ghostly Old Ye's temper flared up and he ended up killing all of them, wouldn't those two old codgers be arrested and executed by firing squad?

The more I thought about it, the more worried I became, to the point where I was this close to rushing back.

To my surprise, Old Thief Yuan contacted me first. "Er Gouzi, I've taken care of things here. Don't worry, not a single hair was harmed."

"I have something to tell you now. I suspect this matter is closely tied to the missing persons cases."

"This comes from the journals of the very last Divine Constable. Based on the timeline, it shouldn't be far removed from the Changchun City disappearance cases. Listen carefully, I'll tell you about it."

In the late Qing Dynasty, during the peak of the Han Chinese migration to the Northeast, a group of people carrying doors on their backs arrived from inside the Shanhai Pass, wandering through the streets and alleys.

Many assumed they were door-craftsmans who specialized in hanging and repairing doors for others, while local door-craftsmans worried these newcomers were trying to steal their livelihood, even going so out of their way to send people to test their background and intentions.

Those men merely tossed out a single sentence: "We make a living carrying doors, which has nothing to do with whether you practice the craft or not." They continued on their own path, wandering about with doors strapped to their backs.

Believing the newcomers showed them no respect, the locals who tested them gathered a bunch of hoodlums and went to make trouble. In the end, out of those door-carriers, only two people stepped forward and claimed over thirty heads.

This incident caused quite a sensation at the time. Because it was a feud within the pugilistic world, according to the unwritten rules, no one reported it to the officials. However, it only made the various factions and sects across the Northeast even more curious about the origins of these people, and quite a few underworld bosses specifically sent spies to tail them.

The door-carriers paid no attention to the surveillance and simply went about their business.

As a result, after trailing them for over a month, those spies—known as harriers—became so terrified that none of them dared to follow them anymore.

Hearing this, I couldn't help but feel intrigued. "Even the harriers were scared off? What background do these people have?"

The paparazzi of today are completely incomparable to the harriers of those days. Back then, anyone capable of working as a harrier possessed genuine martial arts skills. If they tailed someone and discovered something valuable, they might even resort to murder, robbery, or kidnapping for ransom.

Those men hadn't even made a single hostile move yet they frightened away ruthless harriers—it seemed their origins were far more mysterious than I thought!

Old Thief Yuan said, "Listen to the rest of my story!"

According to the accounts of the harriers at the time, those people specifically chose places fraught with great malevolence to settle in.

Upon arriving at their destination, they would place the heavy doors they carried on their backs right in the spots plagued by the most intense demonic activity.

Within three days of setting up the doors, those people were guaranteed to leave, and when they left, they would take a bundle of something with them.

No one ever found out what exactly those people took away.

However, people noticed that wherever they had set up their doors, either water ghosts whipped up towering waves with floating corpses, or ghostly fires scorched the mountains and vengeful spirits blasted open graves.

Harriers were ruthless enough, but their ruthlessness was reserved only for living humans. When had they ever witnessed ghosts and deities? One by one, they were so terrified that they didn't dare follow those people any further.

At the time, many felt these people had dubious origins and were likely engaging in some sort of evil sorcery.

One had to realize that the late Qing Dynasty was a time of national decline and social chaos. Not only did demons and monsters run amok, but evil cultivators murdering people were also a frequent sight. If those people were allowed to unleash some catastrophe, there was no telling who might be dragged down with them in the surrounding villages and towns.

Upon hearing the rumors, people successively sought out local figures of influence, hoping to drive all the door-carriers away. Just as the local elites were discussing how to chase these people off, the door-carriers mysteriously vanished.