Chapter Twenty-Nine: A Blow of Immense Force

Time slipped by in silence.

Lying in the small inner room behind the seaside cottage, Shen Ye opened his eyes.

At a glance, he saw two things beside his hand.

One was the telescope of the Eye of Justice.

The other looked like a small silver-white arrow. It was not very long, not even four inches, but with the slightest flick of the hand and a press of a button—

Whoosh!

One end of the silver-white dart wrapped around Shen Ye's left wrist, while the other shot straight toward the wall opposite him. Between the two ends, a strand of spider silk appeared.

Snap!

It stuck fast.

With a hard pull, Shen Ye only felt a force of recoil come surging back through the silk.

This thing simply could not be used unless one's physical condition was several times that of an ordinary person.

Swinging between high-rise buildings was, by nature, an extremely dangerous thing.

One slow reaction, and you were finished.

If your strength was not enough to hold yourself, you were finished.

Even with a body as strong as his, he could not manage it well on the first try. He would probably need more practice. But practicing in the city was simply courting death. Better to return to his hometown in the county for a while and find some village deep in the mountains and forests to train.

After trying out the two new pieces of equipment, Shen Ye began examining his skills.

He tapped the level-five hero skill, "Mighty Strike." The skill icon lit up, and the description read: in an instant, unleash the full power of the body, producing tremendous force concentrated in the right fist, then surge straight ahead at extremely high speed. Charge distance: five meters. Impact power: one and a half times normal state. Skill cooldown: five minutes.

Seeing this description, Shen Ye could not help but pause.

It could only be used once every five minutes, yet it could actually unleash one and a half times his power. That was almost unbelievable. And it clearly said he would charge forward at extremely high speed, so this move must be extraordinarily fast and very difficult to dodge.

Of course!

This skill would also need to be tested somewhere in the deep mountains and old forests, or else he would never know just how much power it could truly unleash.

Eager to try it out, Shen Ye walked straight out of the bedroom and said to Wen Xiuting, who was washing dishes, "Sister Xiuting, I want to take it easy for the next few days. I do not really feel like keeping the shop open. I will give you a few days off too, so you do not need to work. Spend a few days playing with Xiaonan."

"Rest again?" Wen Xiuting shook her head. "You really are awfully willful. A single day of the seaside cottage can already bring in several thousand yuan in pure profit, and you can just stop whenever you want."

She found Shen Ye's way of doing things hard to understand.

After all, she had lived on a monthly salary of eighteen hundred yuan before, while supporting her family and paying her son's kindergarten tuition. Those had been bitter, unforgettable days.

So money held a strong appeal for her.

"One naturally has to make money in life, but you cannot spend all your time doing it. A person should still have dreams of their own, interests of their own, and do something meaningful in this lifetime," Shen Ye said with a smile. Since it was rare for him to return home from Yang City, he planned to buy some things before going back.

For example, he would bring his mother some nourishing tonics, and perhaps buy her a high-end handbag. Women, they said, loved bags.

He would buy his father a watch worth more than ten thousand yuan. Men had few adornments, and a watch was one of the few. A watch in that range would also look quite respectable.

As for his younger sister, Shen Xiaoyun, what should he bring her? She was in her final year of high school now; she already had a phone, and a student would not really have much use for a handbag. In the end, he decided to buy her a watch too, one costing around ten thousand yuan as well. While buying it, Shen Ye had actually wondered whether spending so much on his sister might make her develop extravagant tastes.

Then he thought better of it. He worked hard to earn money precisely so that his family could live better lives. As long as his sister did not do anything wrong, he would indulge her.

After settling the gifts, Shen Ye drove the new Ford straight toward the county town, with Wen Xiuting and Shen Nan in the back seat. Now that Wen Xiuting had come to this place, her son Shen Nan naturally transferred to the kindergarten here as well.

Shen Nan kept clamoring, "Can we go home yet? I really miss Grandpa and Grandma."

By "Grandpa and Grandma" here, he meant Wen Xiuting's parents.

Shen Nan had become sensible now. He knew that his own father had abandoned his mother for money, so he did not much like his father either. As for Uncle Shen Ye, he was very nice—gentle, and always willing to buy him toys.

This holiday was rare. Wen Xiuting also planned to return to her hometown and visit her parents. They were both getting old.

Naturally, she had bought a pile of gifts as well. Various health supplements, ginseng, notoginseng, and the like, worth a total of two or three thousand yuan.

Her salary had also gone up. She now earned eight thousand yuan a month, more than four times what she had made working as a waitress at a hotel in the county.

Shen Ye was not short of money. Now that the seaside cottage in Yang City was bringing in over a hundred thousand yuan a month, of course he gave her a larger share.

Looking at the gifts worth several thousand yuan in her hands, Wen Xiuting could not help feeling a little emotional. In the past, she had earned far too little, so little that it could only be called surviving. Every time she returned to her parents' home, she was too strapped for cash to bring much of anything. Though her parents understood and never blamed her, she still felt awkward and ashamed.

Besides, in the countryside, there were always a few sharp-tongued women who enjoyed gossiping about other people's affairs. Whenever she returned to her maiden home empty-handed, she was mocked by the neighbors.

When she had been abandoned by Shen Die, divorced, and returned to her parents' home, she had also been mocked by the neighbors.

It had made her parents lose face in the village.

Now, at last, she had money. She could buy her parents gifts worth two or three thousand yuan and see whether the neighbors would still have the nerve to laugh.

Following Shen Ye, she could earn more money and make her parents' lives better. More importantly, she could make Xiaonan's life better too.

Looking at the man driving, Wen Xiuting could not help but let a word rise in her heart: thank you.

Yet when she thought of the faint ambiguity between her and Shen Ye, her cheeks still turned a little red.

The car drove for two hours before reaching the county seat.

"Sister Xiuting, I'll still take you into your village. It'll save you from having to catch the bus," Shen Ye said. "It will not delay anything."

"No need. I can take the bus myself. Shen Ye, if you keep being so courteous, I will only feel even more uneasy," Wen Xiuting said solemnly.

Seeing her insistence, Shen Ye knew that she was, in truth, a very resilient woman at heart. So he could only shrug and drive to the long-distance bus station, where he dropped her off.

Then he drove straight back to his own home.

(The second update is here. After midnight, there will be a third.)