Shopkeeper Chu instinctively raised the scalpel in his hand to ward off the attack, but the sharp scalpel snapped the moment it touched Lu Yan's fist.
The thin layer of golden light was as hard as steel, rendering the fragile scalpel unable to defend. Shards of the blade scattered and left streaks of blood on Shopkeeper Chu's face.
"Bang!"
Lu Yan slammed his fist unreservedly onto Shopkeeper Chu's face, sending his tall, hefty body crashing heavily onto the medical bed.
Shopkeeper Chu was hit so hard that stars appeared in his eyes, blood spurted from his mouth and nose. For someone who has already slaughtered dozens, such injuries weren't fatal but instead aroused the ferocity within him.
With agility that defied his physique, he flipped over to avoid Lu Yan's second punch, grinning viciously as he reached for Lu Yan's throat.
"You little bastard, you're dead!"
But before his hands could touch Lu Yan, they were blocked by that seemingly thin layer of golden light. Only now did he finally perceive the oddity on Lu Yan.
"What is this?"
The smile on Shopkeeper Chu's face vanished, replaced by bewilderment and panic.
He had not detected Lu Yan's use of the Little Golden Light Talisman earlier, and thought the scalpel's breakage was an accident.
It wasn't until he clearly saw the golden light floating on Lu Yan's body that Shopkeeper Chu felt as if his decades of life experience had been completely overturned.
However, the response to his inquiry was Lu Yan's fist.
With one blow, steel collided with blood, flesh, and bone, and Shopkeeper Chu's hand bones snapped inch by inch.
His palm seemed to turn into a puddle of mush, with bleak white bones piercing through the flesh, releasing a torrent of blood. The excruciating pain dominated Shopkeeper Chu's mind.
"Ah!!! You deserve death!!!"
Shopkeeper Chu, still ferocious despite losing his mind, opened his big mouth in an attempt to bite at Lu Yan's neck, but Lu Yan's iron fist was his reply.
All of Shopkeeper Chu's teeth had long been knocked out by the iron fist, dozens of teeth were stuck in his throat, clogging his windpipe before he could spit them out.
One punch, two punches, three punches... Lu Yan swung his fist expressionlessly, as if repeating some mechanical task.
Shopkeeper Chu's face was already a blurry mess of blood and flesh, his collapsed nasal bones had forcibly embedded into his skull, with grayish-white matter continuously oozing from his features.
Only when his fist was cut by broken bones and a sharp pain arose, did Lu Yan cease pounding with his fists.
At this moment, Shopkeeper Chu was dead beyond repair, half an hour ago he was still a high and mighty mid-stage Qi Cultivation cultivator, now reduced to a corpse in a pitiful state.
Sitting on the medical bed beside him, the Little Golden Light Talisman enveloping Lu Yan had already failed during the battle just now, which was why Shopkeeper Chu's broken bone could injure Lu Yan.
As a Spirit Talisman that required no magical power to activate, the Little Golden Light Talisman's effect was relatively limited.
Lu Yan looked at the fallen corpse, and a relieved smile appeared on his face.
"In the end, I won!"
In the original plan, the most prudent approach was to take the items from the basement and update the version away from the Spirit Talisman Workshop.
This would directly avoid a confrontation with Shopkeeper Chu, averting unnecessary danger.
But... Lu Yan was unwilling!
After laboring hard for three months in the Spirit Talisman Workshop, enduring threats to life and exploitation harsher than any capitalist, how could Lu Yan find peace of mind with just fleeing?
Moreover, there was a crucial point—the Demonic Soul Banner in the basement.
Although the method of refining the Soul Banner is cruel, it must be admitted that it is an extremely high-potential Demonic Magical Artifact, the most precious item in the entire Spirit Talisman Workshop.
Lu Yan would not deliberately kill innocent people to refine the Soul Banner, but simply using the Soul Banner that was almost completed would not cause him any psychological burden.
For Lu Yan, who is sure to experience multiple version updates in the future, increasing his strength as much as possible to cope with crises is key.
However, as a Xianxia version Demonic Magical Artifact, if Lu Yan fled the Spirit Talisman Workshop, the Demonic Soul Banner would also disappear with version changes.
To obtain the Soul Banner, Lu Yan must hold the Soul Banner at the moment of version update.
Yet the Soul Banner is a Demonic Magical Artifact, long-term contact by a common person like Lu Yan would only lead to being devoured by spiteful spirits, and there's an 80% chance that Shopkeeper Chu would leave a trap in the forging array, touching it rashly would only bring Shopkeeper Chu back prematurely.
Hence, Lu Yan decided to wait for the version update in the basement, and in that instant of update, briefly contact the Soul Banner and let it go through the version changes together.
Staying in the basement might be risky, as Shopkeeper Chu could come back, posing a certain danger.
Lu Yan chose to place his hopes on the version update, as long as it transitions into a version like the urban version without Extraordinary Power, Shopkeeper Chu would lose his mid-stage Qi Cultivation cultivation.
Even if it's not the urban version, a change in versions where the Extraordinary System differs might give Lu Yan a slim chance of survival.
Without the suppression of cultivation, coupled with Lu Yan having prepared several Spirit Talismans in advance, the probability of killing Shopkeeper Chu was enormous.
Fortunately, Lu Yan won the gamble!
Out of the three options during the version update, the urban version appeared, and the mid-stage demonic cultivator turned into an ordinary person, easily slain by Lu Yan.
Of the several Spirit Talismans he had prepared in advance, only one Little Golden Light Talisman was used.
Thinking of this, Lu Yan looked at the corpse on the ground with a smile.
"Still, I must thank Shopkeeper Chu for the Spirit Talismans."
Those Spirit Talismans were personally drawn by Shopkeeper Chu, meant for sale at the Spirit Talisman Workshop.
However, the Spirit Talismans were targeted at the nobles among commoners, due to their rare demand, there weren't many in stock and had to be pre-ordered, so there weren't many Spirit Talismans drawn by Shopkeeper Chu.
For three months, Lu Yan secretly swapped them, hiding some Spirit Talismans among the talisman papers in the warehouse, thus preserving them.
If not for the Spirit Talismans, even if Shopkeeper Chu lost his cultivation, his displayed ferocity would still far exceed that of ordinary people, Lu Yan would likely be no match for him.
After a brief rest, Lu Yan finally had the mind to scrutinize his surroundings.
Underground factory, frozen corpses, organ trading—seeing these things, an urban legend he heard during the urban version suddenly flashed through Lu Yan's mind.
The city Lu Yan lived in, Los City, is a small third-tier city, where some elderly in the community once seriously propagated the rumor of organ trading.
"I thought it was just an urban legend, but I didn't expect it to be real. Moreover, this organ trading factory perfectly corresponds with Shopkeeper Chu's basement for refining the Soul Banner in the Xianxia version."
"It seems that although different versions cannot completely correlate, some aspects are still common."
Remembering this detail secretly, Lu Yan did not rush to leave.
The commotion caused by killing Shopkeeper Chu just now was quite substantial, and since it didn't attract anyone else, it proves this underground factory likely only had Shopkeeper Chu.
Just in time to take advantage of the absence, Lu Yan intends to organize the gains from this episode, as well as the Soul Banner brought over.