Ren Qing opened the first page and felt a sudden urge to gouge out his own eyes.
He suppressed his discomfort and began to read through it carefully, page by page.
The script in the *No-Eyes Technique* was neat and orderly, but to him, it looked like writhing maggots trying to crawl off the page.
Furthermore, half the book was about how to eat human eyes raw.
If he hadn't already mastered the No-Eyes Technique, he feared he would have been influenced by the words. This just went to show how bizarre the book's author, the Hundred-eyed Elder Monk, must have been.
By the time Ren Qing finished reading the *No-Eyes Technique*, his clothes were soaked with cold sweat, and his eyes were bloodshot and sunken, as if he hadn't slept for days.
He tucked the book close to his body, but on second thought, felt it wasn't safe enough. He simply pulled out a loose brick from the corner of the wall beneath his bed and hid the book in the secret compartment behind it.
Ren Qing then closed his eyes to rest, taking the opportunity to sort through the book's contents in his mind.
First, it was clear that while he had grasped the No-Eyes Technique by consuming Lifespan, he was only at the most basic, entry-level stage.
The Cultivation Method for the No-Eyes Technique involved the Visualization of the Boundless darkness of blindness, which would gradually cause one's eyes to Mutate and grant inhuman power.
Ren Qing had thought he'd grown accustomed to this sort of hellish style, but the contents of the *No-Eyes Technique's* final page were simply too bizarre.
To accelerate the rate of Mutation, one could hold a fresh human eye in their mouth while cultivating. The price, however, was that eyes would begin to sprout all over one's body.
Fortunately, Ren Qing had also learned of the two other branches of the No-Eyes Technique.
This showed that the Information Flow could acquire hidden information about a Cultivation Technique.
For example, the Single-eyed and the Repeater.
For another, although the book recorded that swallowing eyeballs raw could heal injuries, there was no mention of increasing Lifespan. It seemed that even the Hundred-eyed Elder Monk himself had been unaware of this.
In his heart, Ren Qing had already made his choice.
'Compared to growing eyes all over my body or becoming a Single-eyed, having Double Pupils is certainly easier to accept. At least it's... barely within the realm of normal...'
Without realizing it, Ren Qing was already getting used to these bizarre circumstances.
The crow of a rooster pierced the air.
He rubbed his temples and stepped out of his room. The gentle spring sunlight dispelled the clammy chill from his body.
The acrid, foul smell of incinerating corpses wafted from the courtyard.
For the next few days, the furnace would burn nonstop unless another wrongful death occurred on Tan Street. After all, they had to clear out the morgue as quickly as possible.
Xiaowu sat idly on a stone stool in the courtyard, reading a book. The three of them took turns on duty; only two were needed to watch the furnace.
"Brother Qing, I saw you didn't eat at noon, so I saved this for you."
Xiaowu put down the copy of the *Hundred Family Names* he was using to practice his letters and handed a steamed bun to Ren Qing.
When he was at other Firework Halls, besides doing heavy labor every day, he often went hungry. Because of this, he was grateful to Ren Qing from the bottom of his heart.
"I have to leave for a bit. I shouldn't be long."
Ren Qing took another look at the furnace. Seeing that everything was fine, he headed out of the Government Office.
On the way, he encountered all sorts of Government Constables, but they were mostly constables changing shifts for patrol. Fireworkers and Black Slaves were a minority.
After leaving the Government Office, Ren Qing headed straight for a butcher shop. Since he could increase his Lifespan by swallowing eyeballs raw, he naturally had to give it a try.
As he moved through the dense crowd on the street, he gained a new, clearer perception of his own vision. He could easily spot details he would have normally missed: the stains on the clothes of an old man selling candied haws; the money pouch lifted from a scholar stumbling back from the tavern; even a single bee resting on a strand of hair of a woman wearing rouge and powder.
He was becoming more and more proficient in using the No-Eyes Technique.
His peripheral vision fell on a beggar by the side of the street, and he couldn't help but frown.
The beggar looked to be over thirty, limping as he held out a hand to passersby for silver coins, a slightly pained expression on his face.
Ren Qing noticed the beggar's diseased leg. It was twice as thick as a normal person's and covered in pustules.
'How can he move so freely with such severe inflammation?'
He paused for a moment before walking over. Then he took out some loose silver coins and placed them in the beggar's broken bowl.
"Thank you, Lord Official! May the Lord Official live a hundred years..."
The beggar was extremely grateful. As Ren Qing's hand dropped the silver coins, he let it brush against the man's, and a large amount of information converged before his eyes.
[Chen Ergou]
[Age: 28]
[Lifespan: 13 years]
[Skill: Divine Sutra (Incomplete)]
Partial information about the Divine Sutra was then revealed.
[Created by the Heavenly Incomplete Taoist. Cultivation of this method requires the subject, during their childhood while their bones are still growing, to have both legs severed at the hips. The subject must then be confined to a pickling vat and fed specific medicinal concoctions. If they do not die within three years, they will grow divine feet.]
Ren Qing's breathing grew ragged. Forgoing his trip to the butcher shop, he instead wandered through the West City District.
He soon made a startling discovery.
Most of the beggars on the street had leg disabilities, clearly from cultivating the Divine Sutra. However, they were concentrated only in the West District.
Ren Qing realized he'd been looking at things the wrong way.
'If the world's Cultivation Techniques are all this bizarre, then the aptitude requirements can't be high at all. And how much is a human life even worth?'
For many factions, passing down a Cultivation Technique had only advantages and no disadvantages. They could even use it to control a large fighting force.
Sanxiang Town appeared calm on the surface, but in reality, who knew how many Cultivators were hidden within it.
Besides, the town's population was abnormally large. Otherwise, there wouldn't be enough people to use as fodder.
Ren Qing sucked in a cold breath. The slight cockiness in his heart born from grasping the supernatural vanished without a trace.
He returned to Tan Street and entered the butcher shop closest to the Government Office.
The butcher was a burly man in a greasy apron. He was sharpening a cleaver, its reflection sending a chill down the spine.
Just as Ren Qing was about to speak, the butcher said, "Well, if it isn't Ah Qing. Haven't seen you in a few days. I was starting to think something happened to you..."
"Bah, listen to my stupid mouth. I'll give you an extra bit of meat today for that."
Ren Qing gave a sheepish smile. 'The previous owner of this body was so withdrawn he barely knew anyone at the Government Office. How would he have dealings with a butcher?'
He carefully pried the full story from the butcher.
The butcher's surname was Zhang. It was primarily his predecessor's older brother who was acquainted with him. Before he died, he had specifically asked Butcher Zhang to look after Ren Qing, making him one of the few people Ren Qing could exchange a few words with.
"Brother Zhang, I've been having trouble seeing at night recently. Could I get some pig eyes from you to... improve my vision?"
"No problem. If you want them, I'll save them for you from now on."
Butcher Zhang agreed without hesitation. Offal was still bought by some poor souls to eat, but pig eyes were usually just thrown to the stray dogs on the street.
He first chopped a few pounds of pork belly for Ren Qing, wrapped it in oil paper, and then began to dig the eyes out of a pig's head with a small knife.
"Ah Qing, if you had come asking for these a while ago, I'm afraid I really wouldn't have had any pig eyes to give you."
Butcher Zhang said with a laugh, "Someone was specifically paying silver coins to buy them up. Isn't that strange?"
Ren Qing's pupils dilated. He reached out to stop Butcher Zhang. "Brother Zhang, just give me any loose ones you have. You don't have to dig them out specially; it'll ruin the look of the pig's head."
"Also, don't tell anyone I'm getting pig eyes from you..."
Butcher Zhang just thought Ren Qing was afraid of being found out and losing face, so he readily agreed.
But Ren Qing realized that the person who had passed the *No-Eyes Technique* to the bookshop's Shopkeeper was still in Sanxiang Town—and had already started eating human eyes raw.