Chapter 38 – Kill You All

The riders quickly arrived at the clearing. The man in the lead swept his wolf-like eyes across the surroundings, radiating a cold and predatory menace.

He spotted the wild rabbit still roasting over the fire, grabbed it, tore off a bite, and laughed wildly.
“Go. Drag those Dongxia cowards out here. Tie them to the backs of horses. I love watching them suffer—unable to live, unable to die.”

At his laughter, the others joined in, urging their horses faster as they circled the area. They reveled in the chase and the terror they caused, cracking their whips so that the people tied behind their horses shrieked in agony.

At that moment, Xiaojiu leapt down, heading straight for the man whipping the hardest. She grabbed his arm mid-swing, then slammed him into the ground with such force that a man-shaped dent appeared. The man lay motionless.

Almost simultaneously, Zhao Hu loosed his arrows.

The first shot—missed.
The second—struck the man’s thigh. Progress.
The third—hit his backside. Getting better.
…

Tieniu and Xiaoliuzi quickly joined Xiaojiu in the fight.

Xiaoliuzi took the front, while Tieniu, small and agile, darted in and out of the chaos—stabbing here, poking there. The pain he inflicted made his enemies forget Xiaoliuzi entirely; all they wanted was to kill this little brat.

A’dou scrambled up a tree with his slingshot, aiming straight for the enemy’s eyes.

It didn’t take long for the riders to pinpoint Zhao Hu and A’dou’s positions. But these kids, while maybe not masters of martial arts, had exceptional lightness skills.

Especially A’dou and Zhao Hu—one with a bow, the other with a slingshot—hidden among the branches, constantly switching trees, making themselves maddeningly hard to catch.

Meanwhile, the group lying in wait on the hillside—Shen Zhiyuan and the others—was spotted. Several men, knives in hand, assumed the group hiding here must be defenseless.

They advanced with malicious grins, eager to vent their cruelty. But sometimes, high-tech was far scarier than martial arts.

The quiet boy, the one everyone thought was mute, silently pulled out an electric baton. He pressed the switch, jabbed it into the man’s foot, and looked up innocently at the towering figure before him.

Then something miraculous happened—the knife-wielding man convulsed violently, spasming in midair before collapsing motionless.

The other kids quickly copied him. At first they poked cautiously; soon they were chasing down enemies, jabbing them at every chance.

From a distance, Xiaojiu saw it—the hillside had turned into a nightmare for their attackers. Knife-wielding men fled like they’d seen ghosts, while a pack of children chased them down. Anyone caught danced a brief “electric boogie” before dropping to the ground.

Even Zhao Hu and the others noticed and suddenly found their own weapons less appealing—they wanted to join in too.

But Xiaojiu’s eyes narrowed when she saw the enemy raise their blades toward the half-dead captives they’d been dragging.

Her anger flared.
“Zhao Hu, A’dou—save them!”

To catch the thieves, catch the leader first. Xiaojiu launched herself toward the enemy leader.

The mounted man saw the little girl coming for him. His eyes darkened; he drew a large saber from his back and leapt from the saddle, swinging straight for her head.

But Xiaojiu was faster. In the blink of an eye, she was right in front of him.

Her fist shot forward, slamming hard into his abdomen.

The man never imagined that this girl—barely reaching his thigh—could move with such explosive speed. The blow sent him flying, his saber clattering to the ground. Pain wracked his insides as if his organs were being torn apart.

“Let go of our general! Does your Eastern Xia Kingdom want to start a war?”
The others saw their general pinned underfoot and instantly flew into a rage, all raising their blades and slashing toward Xiaojiu .

Xiaojiu ’s voice was icy cold. “This is your general? Pathetic. Playing with human lives? I’ll cut you all down.”

She picked up the general’s broadsword and swung at anyone in sight. In her hands, the otherwise ordinary blade seemed to brim with boundless power, becoming incomparably sharp—cutting through people as if they were radishes.

Xiao Liuzi and Iron Ox coordinated with her perfectly.

The fight ended quickly. Aside from Xiao Liuzi suffering a few scratches, no one else was injured. The group on the hillside—those who couldn’t fight at all—were exhilarated, swelling with confidence, convinced they could now take on an enemy army of a hundred thousand.

“We need to leave here quickly,” Old Gu was the first to react. “These men aren’t from Eastern Xia, and they might have reinforcements.”

Xiaojiu nodded, then began searching the bodies with Zhao Hu and the others, stripping them of anything valuable. The rest of the group quickly followed suit.

At last, they looked toward the group of barely-breathing commoners who had been dragged along, unsure what to do.

They turned to Old Gu.

Xiaojiu asked, “And them? Where should they be placed?”

She crouched down, looking at a bloodied man about Zhao Hu’s father’s age, and asked, “Who are you? Why were you tied up by them?”

Seeing his savior asking, the man quickly clasped his fists and knelt. “Thank you, benefactors. We are already deeply grateful you saved us. We’re blacksmiths from the city. Some time ago, a group of men came to us, asking us to forge weapons for them. They didn’t look like Eastern Xia people, so we refused. Those beasts then captured all of us blacksmiths—along with our families.”

At this point, the man was overcome with fury, thinking of his daughter and wife…

The others began to weep, remembering their daughters and wives who had been killed.

Unable to contain themselves any longer, they picked up the blades from the ground and hacked furiously at the corpses lying there.

“Beast!”
“Give me back my daughter!”
“Give me back my wife!”
“Die!”
“Cut you to pieces!”
“…”

When Xiaojiu saw they had vented enough, she quickly asked, “Can you still walk?”

“We’ll leave two carts for you. I know a place you can go. If you trust me, follow my Cuihua—she knows the way.”

The group nodded at once. Their homes were gone—wherever they went made no difference now.

Cuihua tilted her head at Xiaojiu .

I know the way?

Xiaojiu patted Cuihua’s head. “That cave—remember? Take them there. Aren’t you familiar with the kids inside? When the mission’s done, I’ll build you a little villa.”

Last time Xiaojiu had rescued people from the cave, she had returned again later. When a group of men in black tried to kill those children to silence them, Xiaojiu saved them. She had even installed high-tech traps at every entrance, making it impossible for ordinary people to enter.

She had also brought many sweet potato seedlings and chili seeds, asking Lin Qi and the others to teach them how to grow them.

Now the children inside were living quite comfortably.

No wonder Magistrate Shen wanted to arrange a place for them—those kids refused to leave the cave no matter what.

Hearing she’d get her own little villa, Cuihua bobbed her head furiously.

Cluck cluck!
Don’t worry, I’ll definitely finish the task!

The old man quickly pulled out medicine from his person to treat the man’s wounds. “Apply this to prevent infection.”

Xiaojiu and her group also handed over the money they’d taken from the corpses. “Take this with you. Once you get there, if anything happens, look for someone named Lin Qi.”