This... what on earth is going on? How did I get knocked flying? And that kid—when he attacked, why did it feel like his spiritual energy was compressed even more tightly than mine?

The three martial artists lying on the ground were all dumbfounded. Not only them, but even the few old farmers nearby were stunned.

How did Mike Sullivan become so powerful? Wasn't Mike Sullivan expelled from the sect because he couldn't become a martial artist? How... how did Mike Sullivan become a martial artist again?

Not only did he become a martial artist, Mike Sullivan even defeated the other three martial artists!

Sure enough, heaven truly favors good people—good deeds are always rewarded.

Looking at the three men writhing in pain on the ground, Mike Sullivan felt a bit dizzy inside—he was actually this strong!

This was his first time fighting real martial artists, and he had defeated all three in a single encounter. The so-called basic martial arts techniques they used felt far inferior to his own Farmer’s Fist.

And then there was his spiritual energy.

Even though he was only at the early stage of Spirit Induction, when he fought the mid-stage Spirit Induction martial artist just now, he could easily grab the opponent’s arm. In terms of the purity of spiritual energy, his was clearly much purer.

The purer the spiritual energy, the greater the force generated when channeling it.

If he could defeat a mid-stage Spirit Induction martial artist so easily, what about those at the late stage? Could he handle them too? After all, the spiritual energy he absorbed came from the Immortal Realm.

As Mike Sullivan was pondering this, the three men on the ground suddenly started shouting.

“You country bumpkin, how dare you injure us! Do you even know who we are?” The mid-stage Spirit Induction martial artist, enduring the agony of broken bones, threatened, “Let me tell you, we’re members of the Sangshan Gang! If you mess with us, you’re as good as dead!”

“Sangshan Gang? What kind of gang is that?” Mike Sullivan turned back in confusion and looked at the old farmer beside him. In the six months since he’d returned, he really hadn’t heard of this gang before.

“The Sangshan Gang is a group of martial artists from our village. There are a dozen or so of them, all martial artists. They wander around the countryside, always up to petty theft and robbery.”

“Oh, so that’s the kind of gang they are.” Mike Sullivan laughed. Aren’t they just a bunch of thugs? Back on Earth before he transmigrated, they wouldn’t even count as a real gang, not even as street punks—at least those guys had a turf to show off, these guys had nothing.

Seeing Mike Sullivan remain silent, the mid-stage Spirit Induction martial artist thought he was scared and immediately said, “Now you know how powerful the Sangshan Gang is, right? Listen, the two hundred taels of silver you took from us wasn’t even our own money—it belongs to the gang. If you take our gang’s money, we won’t let you off. Hand over the money, and give us a few hundred more taels, and we’ll let this go. Otherwise, your whole village will be wiped out!”

Mike Sullivan shook his head and looked at the martial artist, feeling curious—was this guy right in the head? He’d already been beaten, yet he was still so arrogant. Wipe out his village? Never mind whether they’d dare do such a thing in the Great Peng Dynasty—even if they dared, did they have the strength?

His village wasn’t a big one, but there were still over a hundred households. If the villagers hadn’t all gone up the mountain to gather herbs today, would these three even dare set foot in the village?

But what to do with these three was a real problem.

The laws of the Great Peng Dynasty were strict. If he killed these three before earning any official merit, and it was found out, he’d be in big trouble—he might even implicate the whole village.

As for letting them go, that was even less of an option. If he let them go, they’d just come back with more people to cause trouble.

These three—he couldn’t kill them, but he couldn’t let them go either.

The only solution was to lock them up.

Mike Sullivan turned to an old farmer behind him and suddenly asked, “Mr. Harris, is there any space left in the cellar where we store radishes and cabbages?”

Most people in Nanlin Village had the surname Lin, with only a few exceptions. Mr. Harris was the only person in the village with the surname Xu, but he’d lived there for many years and was quite respected.

“The cellar? There’s space, of course there’s space,” Mr. Harris replied without hesitation.

“That’s great, let’s lock them up in the cellar.”

“Lock them in the cellar? Isn’t that a bit much?” Mr. Harris hesitated.

“There’s nothing wrong with it—it’s the best solution,” Mike Sullivan said firmly. “We can’t kill them, but we can’t let them go either. If we let them go, they’ll just bring more people to mess with our village. Locking them up is the best way!”

After thinking it over, Mr. Harris finally nodded. “Right, lock them up. That’s the best way.”

Soon, under Mr. Clark’s lead, everyone locked the three injured men in the cellar.