Chapter 4: What a Big Fire

As soon as he finished speaking, the group of over thirty people burst into loud laughter.

They were laughing heartily and feeling quite pleased with themselves.

Suddenly, one of the men looked like he had been hit by something.

He fell straight off his horse. The leader quickly asked what had happened, and one of the underlings got off his horse to check on the man lying on the ground.

After a glance, he jumped in fright. “Boss, he’s dead. Something pierced through his head and killed him instantly.”

The boss, upon hearing that, looked into the empty air and shouted,

“Who’s there?”

“If you’ve got guts to attack, don’t hide like a coward!” A few moments passed, and the people on horseback looked around nervously.

Then—another man fell off his horse, killed in exactly the same way as the first.

Someone saw it clearly this time. He watched, eyes wide open, as a stone flew straight through the head of the man in front of him, leaving a bloody hole. The man toppled off his horse.

With a terrified scream, he spooked the horses around him.

“Stop screaming! All of you, shut up!”

“Maybe we should get out of here! This is too creepy.”

Just as the tension hit its peak, a wolf and a young girl appeared directly in front of them.

The man on the horse stared at her in disbelief and asked, “Was it you who killed my men?”

The leader said, “Little girl, stop lying to us. The real killer is hiding behind you.”

“Show yourself and fight fair! Sending out a little girl to die in your place—how shameful!”

Xiner turned to Ada and said, “They don’t believe I’m the one who did it. What should I do, Ada?”

The men burst into laughter again. “Little girl, that guy must’ve taught you what to say, right?”

Then they shouted into the air, “If you’ve got any guts, come out! Stop playing tricks behind our backs!”

“A grown man sending a little girl to die in his place—what a coward!”

After the shouting, only the wind answered. The men on horseback glanced around anxiously, terrified they might be next.

Even the leader’s hands were sweating as he gripped the reins.

“If you don’t show yourself, don’t blame us for being ruthless.” Then he turned and said, “Xiao Liu, go grab that girl.”

“If you still don’t show yourself, we’ll kill her.”

“But Boss, there’s a wolf beside her!” one of the men said hesitantly. The boss kicked him angrily.

“Then send four men. Kill the wolf first—we might even get some wolf meat later.”

As five men approached, Xiner smiled even more brightly.

They came closer with knives drawn, about to strike Ada.

Before the blade could land, a strong gust of wind whooshed by. The man’s knife dropped to the ground.

He clutched his neck with both hands, eyes wide in shock—a stone had pierced through his throat.

The boss, still on his horse, couldn’t believe his eyes. Was it really the little girl who made the move just now?

Ada saw the rest of the men trying to escape and immediately gave chase. Soon after, screams rang out.

One after another, the men fell. Those still on horseback were terrified.

They tried to flee on their horses, but after only a few steps, they all started dropping like dumplings into soup—thud, thud, they fell to the ground.

Each body had a bloody hole in the neck, eyes wide open in death.

Xiner clapped her hands happily and said, “Ada, we’ve got more silver again!”

A wolf began rummaging through the corpses, searching for hidden silver in their clothes.

Xiner joyfully collected everything, especially delighted to find a few hundred silver notes and loose silver pieces on the leader.

After looting all the bodies, she looked at the horses—they looked nice too—so she stored them away into her space.

Looking at the pile of corpses, Xiner and Ada threw branches over them and lit a fire.

Before long, the flames roared higher. Ada wasn’t afraid and simply sat with Xiner, watching the fire crackle.

You might wonder—why wasn’t the wolf afraid of fire?

Because Xiner had told Ada that fear of fire would be a weakness.

So ever since Xiner was little, she had trained him. Ada had been terrified back then.

Just thinking about it made her chuckle. She even remembered one time when Ada’s tail almost got completely burnt off.

It had taken a long time to grow back.

As they were watching the fire in a daze, a gust of wind suddenly blew through.

Somehow, the flames jumped onto a nearby house.

It hadn’t rained in a long time, and the thatched roof was extremely dry—so the fire instantly caught.

The house quickly went up in flames, and soon it spread to the second one.

Xiner and Ada looked at each other, then glanced up at the sky—feeling a bit guilty.

They had chosen the easy way out and hadn’t moved the bodies to an open space, just burned them where they fell.

But who would’ve thought there’d suddenly be wind, when it was calm just moments ago?

Now two houses were on fire…