Chapter 1 Please Shake Hands With Me
The man walked through the dense fog. It really wasn’t that he wanted to be here; the problem was that he had died. He was just walking when his hypoglycemia acted up. His vision went black—anyone with hypoglycemia would understand—and then, when he opened his eyes, he was here.
He even acquired a cheat-like ability, an exceptionally bugged cheat, called [Please Shake My Hand].
This ability was truly overpowered. The crux wasn’t that shaking hands could copy the other party’s ability; it was that if the other party disagreed, or failed to answer within five seconds, it would trigger [Shake My Hand]. That’s right, just one word missing, but that one word made a world of difference.
The former was asking for the other party’s opinion, while the latter was a notification.
A notification, as the name implies, was just telling you. I don’t care if you agree or not, just hand it over.
He had been wandering in this fog for a while now. He found a few buildings housing several towering existences. But the moment he glanced at them, reached out his hand, and uttered that friendly line, the other party would immediately grasp his hand with both of theirs.
They bowed their waists as if a subordinate were meeting their superior—respectful and utterly reverent. He even saw fear in the eyes of that group, as if he were some terrifying entity.
He tried so hard to put on a smiling face, so why were they still like this?
After experiencing handshakes across several areas, he was completely bewildered about his own strength. He had no concept of it, merely treating it as ‘having more skills doesn’t weigh one down’.
When he had walked for about a year, he surprisingly walked out of the fog. Thrilled, he wept tears of joy. His life during this period had been truly miserable. There was no other reason than the fact that for food and drink, he had to freshly slaughter those butt-ugly things. As for his living conditions, they were hard to describe in a few words. But now, he finally had a proper place to stay.
……
My name is Li Riyue, a tragic transmigrator. I possess an exceptionally bugged cheat, a cheat that allows me to live a couple of days longer in this world.
Why only a couple of days longer? After all, with such an absurdly powerful cheat, I should at least be able to live out a full life. But this is Zhan Shen! This entire world is fake. Once the protagonist finishes his path, I’ll be completely BBQ’d.
So why do I call myself a tragic transmigrator? There is evidence for this. First, I transmigrated into Zhan Shen. This actually isn’t a big deal; living peacefully as a normal person would be fine. The second point is the most crucial.
Because I came out of the fog, I was immediately caught by my own people as soon as I approached. Right now, I am detained, my hands cuffed in some black contraption made of an unknown material. The thing was quite heavy, pressing down on his wrists until they ached. Raising his hands to rub his reddened wrists, he looked outside the carriage and spoke.
“Where are we going?”
“To the place assigned to you.”
The middle-aged man sitting opposite him sipping tea took a small sip. His gaze sized up Li Riyue, and seeing the other party constantly touching the item on his hands, he spoke.
“This is just a minor method to prevent someone from abusing their Jinxu. It’s perfectly normal that you can’t sense your Jinxu, there’s no need to panic.”
Li Riyue looked at the thing on his hands in confusion. Feeling it was a bit of a hindrance, he decided to see how far the middle chain could stretch. As a result, with a gentle tug, the chain snapped apart.
Both sides fell silent. Li Riyue dangled the chain, raising his eyes to cautiously glance at the man opposite him. Seeing the other’s face darken, he immediately used his Jinxu to melt it through high temperatures, fused it back together, poured a little water on it, and restored it to its original state.
Seeing Li Riyue act like this, the corner of the man’s mouth twitched. He really wanted to take back what he had just said. Finally, he forced a calm cough, pulled out a thickened pair of handcuffs, and slapped them onto Li Riyue.
This time, Li Riyue didn’t plan on testing them. Anyway, as long as he explained himself clearly, everything should be fine… my ass!
He followed the man to the top floor of a high-end building. Pushing open the office door, the person sitting inside immediately started assessing him.
What followed was a standard interrogation. However, when asked to demonstrate his Jinxu, he hesitated. Along the way, he had shaken hands with quite a few people. It was impossible for him to show this person multiple Jinxu, so which Jinxu should he display?
After hesitating for a long time, he chose his innate ability, extending his handcuffed right hand.
“Please shake my hand.”
Li Riyue stared at the man sitting opposite him, just holding his hand up like that. The man was also looking at him. Five seconds later, the man’s hand reached out on its own, as if it would detach itself from his body to shake hands with the other party if it didn’t comply.
Under the man’s shocked gaze, he grasped that harmless-looking hand. Then, one second, two seconds, three seconds… The man drew his hand back in confusion, looking at Li Riyue.
“This is your Jinxu? Just, simply, shaking hands?”
“Correct, shaking hands. It can also be phrased differently. For example, please finish the tea in your cup and shake my hand.”
Then, the man’s hand lost control, independently forcing him to drink a cup of tea before returning to shake hands with Li Riyue.
The immense power of this skill had already been witnessed by both of them. To make a bold hypothesis, if Li Riyue told an opponent to slit their own throat and then shake his hand, and the opponent failed to answer or refused within five seconds, they would die to this Jinxu.
So here came the question. The man studied the cuffs on Li Riyue’s hands and spoke.
“What realm are you currently in?”
“I don’t know. After I woke up, I was in that fog. Then I just went around shaking hands with people. When I got hungry, I ate those butt-ugly things, and after that, I kept walking until I got here.”
“…Let me formally introduce myself. Commander-in-Chief of the Da Xia Shouyeren, Ye Fan.”
“Person of Da Xia, Li Riyue.”
“Let’s get straight to business. If you have nowhere to go, I hope you can join the Shouyeren. With the descent of the fog, many mystics have appeared within Da Xia‘s borders. We are exactly in need of manpower, and your abilities can help us perfectly. In return, we will provide you with food and accommodation.”
“So basically, room and board provided, but no pay?”
“You can’t phrase it like that. A standard monthly salary, how does seven thousand sound?”
“What about overtime? Also, what if the mystics are at different realms and take different amounts of mental energy to kill? Don’t tell me there’s no commission?”
“…Then how about this. We’ll divide it by realm: one hundred for a Zhan Realm, two hundred for a Chi Realm, three hundred for a Chuan Realm, four hundred for a Hai Realm, five hundred for Wuliang, and one thousand for Kelaiyin.”
“And for those even higher?”
“…You really dare to ask. Anything higher counts as five thousand. If you have the guts to kill them, I have the guts to pay.”
“Then I might as well go into the fog and catch a god to bring back.”
“I need to see the corpse, otherwise I can’t confirm that you killed it.”
“Simple. I picked up a spatial storage ring in the fog. Without further ado, where do we start?”
……
Holding a phone and carrying a black box on his back, Li Riyue met with Squad 131, who had rushed over to explain the situation. Eating a Jianbing Guozi, he listened to their description and asked a critical question.
“Does the target have hands or claws?”
[Squad 131: …Is this really the time to be talking about that?]
The captain of Squad 131 thought about the question for a moment before speaking.
“Yes, it does. Our instruments detect that the target possesses the mental energy fluctuations of the Kelaiyin Realm. Are you sure this is fine?”
“Then it’s simple. Find it, and shake its hand.”
Though they didn’t understand, the group still led Li Riyue to the scene of the incident.
Li Riyue expanded his mental energy, sensing the powerful fluctuations in the surroundings, and quickly locked onto the target. He then led the team out. After finding the mystic, right in front of the others, he spoke that very sentence to the mystic that was busy feeding.
“Please slit your own throat and shake my hand.”
The group paused their movements of gripping their Xingchen Dao. Just as they were feeling confused, five seconds later, they witnessed the mystic’s suicidal corpse swoosh forward, raising its hand and dragging its own body over to shake hands with Li Riyue, before being stored away into his spatial ring.
Under the shocked gazes of the squad, Li Riyue wiped his hands, bid them farewell, and went to collect his money.
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