Infinite Professions from a Pearl Collector
Chapter 16 - 14: Advancement, Nightwalker

Chapter 16: Chapter 14: Advancement, Nightwalker

Three Professions, representing three completely different paths, lay before Chen Ye.

Mechanical Hand, specializing in bypassing locks and disabling traps, is the bane of all treasuries and secret chambers, but its direct combat abilities are somewhat weak. Thousand-Faced Guest, skilled in disguise and infiltration, plays a game of hearts and minds, of schemes and trickery, making it the most suitable for infiltrating enemy ranks.

As for Nightwalker...

Chen Ye’s gaze was locked on the description for Nightwalker.

This was the purest, most direct evolution of the Flying Thief Profession! It didn’t diverge into the side branches of technical skills or disguise. Instead, it honed the arts of Stealth and assassination to their absolute peak.

’And what am I best at?’

’Body Technique, speed, and my Fast Blade!’

’Mechanical skills and disguise are useful, to be sure, but they aren’t my core strength. The path I want to walk is one that cuts through the darkness, a path of slaughter where I crush everything with absolute power.’

’I choose... Nightwalker.’

Chen Ye made his decision.

The next moment, the text on the system panel flickered and changed before settling.

[Profession Change Successful!]

[Name: Chen Ye]

[Profession: Nightwalker (Level 1)]

[Talent: Shadow’s Son (You are a favorite of the shadows, born to become one with the darkness. In shadow, your presence, sounds, and form are greatly concealed, making you almost undetectable.)]

[Existing Skills: Skillful Hand Level 10, Fast Blade Level 10, Roof Walking Level 6]

A warm current instantly spread through his entire body, and Chen Ye felt his body undergoing some kind of wondrous change. His breathing became deeper and more even, his heartbeat grew steadier, and his eyes seemed to see farther and more clearly in the dark.

He just stood there quietly, and it was as if his entire being was about to merge with the surrounding darkness.

This was an unprecedented feeling.

A thought stirred in Chen Ye’s mind, and he tentatively took a step forward.

There was no sound.

His foot landed without stirring up so much as a speck of dust. He was like a weightless Ghost Spirit, as if he had simply glided a short distance through the shadows.

He then tried weaving and darting about the small room. His movements were as silent and ghostly as a phantom, with even the faint rustle of his clothes suppressed to a bare minimum.

If his previous skill, Light as a Feather, had allowed him to run faster and jump higher across the rooftops, then his new Talent, Shadow’s Son, had truly made him a part of the night itself.

The former was a skill. The latter was an instinct.

Chen Ye pushed open the window and vaulted into the large, communal courtyard below.

He didn’t deliberately seek out the shadows, merely strolling aimlessly through the yard.

And yet, even so, his presence was diminished to almost nothing.

Even the old cat in the corner of the yard, normally the most alert of creatures, showed no sign of noticing him. As Chen Ye walked right past it, the cat didn’t even lift an eyelid.

A surge of indescribable excitement welled up inside Chen Ye.

’With the help of this Talent,’ he thought, ’is there any place in this wide world I cannot go?’

’Even the most heavily-guarded manors of the noble houses would have a hard time stopping me now.’

The following days passed peacefully. Chen Ye maintained his routine of blending in with the city crowds by day and training diligently alone by night. Only now, his training regimen included a new focus—perfectly mastering his Shadow’s Son Talent.

Before he knew it, the Mid-Autumn Festival was upon them.

It was a day for family reunions, but just then, a swift horse from the north burst into the city at incredible speed.

The guards at the city gate didn’t dare to stop the rider. On the contrary, they had to clear a path immediately, for the man on the swift horse was a messenger wearing a Yanling Hat.

This hat signified an 800-li express dispatch—a military report of the utmost urgency. The courier had the authority to ride straight to the Imperial Palace, and anyone who dared to obstruct him would be killed without mercy.

Soon, the messenger spurred his horse down the main street and charged straight into the Imperial City, leaving a crowd of shocked and bewildered commoners to gossip in his wake.

"What’s going on? Is there trouble at the border?"

"Who knows? Let’s just hope it’s nothing serious."

But their hopes were in vain. Just half a day later, news from the battlefront began to circulate.

The barbarians on the grassland, who had long been eyeing the border with greedy eyes, could finally no longer restrain themselves and launched a brazen attack. The border defenses were in a state of neglect, and so, overnight, the three cities of Yuguan, Stone Port, and Ning Wu all fell.

This news was like a bucket of ice water dumped over the Capital City, extinguishing its festive atmosphere in an instant.

An emotion called panic began to spread silently through the populace.

In the days that followed, the situation grew more chaotic by the day.

One day, the news was that the Grassland cavalry had breached Xiongzhou and slaughtered its people for three days until the rivers ran red with blood. The next day, it was that another city was under siege, its defenders in grave peril. Bad news fell like an avalanche of snow from the north.

Meanwhile, in several southern prefectures, a combination of natural disasters and man-made calamities led to refugee uprisings. Though small in scale and quickly suppressed by government troops, it was clear that the sparks of a wildfire had been quietly lit on the dry plains of Great Zhao.

To fend off the Grassland cavalry, the Court began a frantic expansion of the army, conscripting Soldiers and forging weapons all across the land. The enormous military expenditures were a bottomless pit, rapidly draining the already exhausted National Treasury.

As for where the rest of the money would come from?

There was no choice but to squeeze the common people a little harder.

And so, all manner of exorbitant taxes and levies appeared one after another. The price of grain skyrocketed, and the meager food stores in the homes of ordinary families quickly ran out.

The people of the Capital City were still somewhat better off; after all, they were at the foot of the Emperor’s throne, and the Court had to maintain some face. But the countryside beyond the city walls was already a living Hell.

Countless farmers toiled for an entire year only to find their harvest wasn’t even enough to cover rent and taxes. Out of desperation, they had no choice but to sell their sons and daughters, their wives and their land.

The people were left destitute, and the land was filled with the bodies of the starved.

Huge masses of villagers who could no longer survive dragged their families along with them, forming a great torrent of humanity that flowed toward cities like the Capital City, hoping to find some way to live.

The streets of South City were filled with sallow, emaciated Refugees in ragged clothes. They huddled in corners, staring at passersby with numb, vacant eyes. The air was thick with the stench of despair and death.

Chen Ye observed all of this with a cold eye.

He saw a mother sell her seven-year-old daughter to a human trafficker for half a coarse steamed bun. He also saw an old man kneeling on the ground, bashing his head against the pavement until it bled, just to beg for a mouthful of food.

He knew then that the Great Zhao Dynasty was like a broken, sinking ship. Everyone knew it was doomed; they just didn’t know the precise moment it would finally go under.

The laughable part, however, was that even in this situation, the great Noble Families and the Royal Family and Relatives, perched high above the clouds, were still living in a drunken stupor.

The banquets in their mansions never ceased. They even took advantage of the soaring grain prices to hoard supplies and speculate, squeezing the very last blood-soaked copper coin from the gaunt and starving commoners.

They seemed utterly unconcerned that the monstrous resentment of the people would turn back on them. They had no idea that this wealth, stained with blood and tears, would likely become the very price paid for their own demise.

Or perhaps they had thought of it, and simply didn’t care.

And amid this burgeoning chaos, Chen Ye began to act.

He intended to use his own power to try and change this goddamn world.

’Even if one man’s power is insignificant, doing something is better than doing nothing at all!’

And the first target he chose was the grain emporium run by the Lin Family.