As soon as these words were spoken, Liu Ruyan's eyes widened in disbelief.
What on earth?
They were actually going to roll on the mountain of knives?
That could kill someone!
Besides, what was the status of a mere Linjiacun Village resident worth?
Compared to a million yuan and these life-or-death crises, it was completely insignificant.
Why would anyone choose the mountain of knives?
What was so great about being a resident of Linjiacun Village?
Wasn't it just a rundown mountain village? At most, it came with a rural household registration.
"Could this be... a threat? Are these people so oppressed by this person that they don't even dare to leave the village?"
A thought popped into Liu Ruyan's mind, and she immediately felt that this was highly likely.
Otherwise, there was no way to explain why these people would rather give up a million yuan and risk their lives just to preserve their status as Linjiacun Village residents!
The netizens in the livestreaming room shared much the same sentiment.
"It really feels like they're too terrified to leave Linjiacun Village!"
"Exactly, otherwise they'd never make such an absurd choice."
"Sigh, I just hope Sister Ruyan finds evidence of this guy's illegal activities soon! Hurry up and arrest him!"
"Tsk tsk tsk, I can't even imagine how miserable these villagers' lives must be!"
"But seriously, rolling on a mountain of knives sounds fatal!"
"If someone actually dies, whose fault is it going to be?"
"Who knows? Probably pinned on this guy."
Lin Xian nodded. "You can begin."
Gritting his teeth, Lin Dahu forced himself up from the ground. He looked at the mountain of knives before him and stripped off his jacket. Although the winter weather here wasn't exceptionally frigid, the temperature was still below ten degrees Celsius.
Lin Dahu swallowed hard as he gazed at the jagged blades. The knife mountain looked dangerous, and in truth, it was completely unsafe.
Liu Ruyan watched the scene with bated breath.
If someone genuinely died here, Lin Xian would bear inescapable responsibility.
The expressions of the two human traffickers kneeling on the ground grew even more panicked.
If these people were this ruthless to their own kind, what about outsiders like them? What kind of fate awaited them?
These ignorant peasants—they had heard plenty of stories about traffickers being beaten to death by villagers.
Beaten to death by hand!
Just thinking about it was terrifying.
Lin Dahu approached the knife mountain and slowly laid down upon the blades.
This was a rule of the village!
Although the blades looked incomparably sharp and a death sentence in every sense, in reality, as long as one mastered the proper technique, the survival rate was quite high!
Of course, it was going to be excruciatingly painful!
Liu Ruyan closed her eyes, not quite daring to watch, though she still left a tiny crack between her eyelids.
The netizens in the livestreaming room were equally horrified by the spectacle.
"Holy crap, he's actually rolling!"
"Isn't he dead for sure? Those knives are fully unsheathed; I feel like he's going to flatline any second!"
"If he actually dies, this guy won't be able to escape the law!"
The moment Lin Dahu lay down upon the knife mountain, a wave of sharp pain lanced across his back.
He clenched his teeth, knowing the blades might soon slice through his skin, but he forced his body to relax as much as possible, spreading his back flat across the edges of the knives.
In this way, the pressure of the blades against his back was significantly reduced.
The knife mountain wasn't long—only about two meters.
Gritting his teeth, Lin Dahu rolled across the blades.
His young daughter stood nearby, watching her father roll across the bed of knives. Oblivious to what was actually happening, she clapped her hands and broke into a silly smile.
When Lin Dahu rolled over onto his front, his back was already dripping with blood, the torn flesh peeling back.
Liu Ruyan couldn't help letting out a gasp.
She looked at the young man standing before her; he hadn't so much as flickered an eyebrow. This sight chilled Liu Ruyan to the bone. No wonder he was able to cow the entire village into fear at such a young age.
"This is just too bloody."
Inside the monitoring room, a police officer couldn't help speaking up.
"Aren't we going to step in and stop this?"
"How are you supposed to step in? Villages like that are completely lawless to begin with."
Another officer replied.
Everyone turned their gaze toward Zhao Guoan, who was in full command.
Zhao Guoan fixed his eyes on the serene young man on the screen. To possess such composure at his age—no wonder he could commit so many crimes without leaving behind a single trace.
"Wait. Once a life is lost and we secure the crucial evidence, we move in," Zhao Guoan said in a deep voice.
The moment this person revealed a fatal flaw, they would strike without hesitation.
"Ah!"
Lin Dahu couldn't help letting out a piercing scream.
Once the wounds on his back opened up, every single roll deepened the lacerations.
The blades were already smeared with blood.
Fortunately, the knife mountain wasn't very long; otherwise, even if he weren't sliced to death by the blades, he would have perished from blood loss.
Two men stationed on the other side of the knife mountain stepped forward and caught Lin Dahu as he rolled off.
"Take him away for treatment," Lin Xian instructed, looking at Lin Dahu.
The village rules had been fulfilled, so this matter could be considered water under the bridge.
The two men scooped up Lin Dahu and hurried toward the village clinic.
Lin Xian turned his head to look at the two traffickers whose hands were bound behind their backs.
The ringleader, Liu Liang, looked at Lin Xian and forced a clumsy smile. He was nearly frightened out of his wits. Were these people really this vicious?
If they were this ruthless to their own people, how were they going to deal with them?!
"Little brother, it's a misunderstanding, a total misunderstanding!" Liu Liang blurted out in a rush.
He was terrified that Lin Xian might take a dislike to them and send them rolling across the knife mountain next!
"A misunderstanding?"
Before Lin Xian could speak, Lin Zhang chimed in. He cast a hostile glare at the two traffickers. "Scum like you deserve to be beaten to death!"
He spat out the words viciously.
"Huh?"
Upon hearing this, Liu Liang felt like he was about to die of fright—beaten to death by hand!
"Great-Grandfather, stay out of this. Let me handle it. Traffickers like these deserve to be beaten straight to death!" Lin Zhang looked over at Lin Xian. This bastard was utterly despicable; not only did they engage in human trafficking, but the person they tried to traffic was their very own Great-Grandfather.
If not for a bizarre twist of fate that brought Great-Grandfather back to the village, they would have truly lost him to the remote mountains forever.
These two men were sinners against Linjiacun Village!
None of them in Linjiacun Village would ever have the face to look their ancestors in the eye!
Liu Ruyan swallowed hard, watching Lin Xian with bated breath. If Lin Xian nodded right now, this would constitute direct evidence of murder!
Lin Xian remained silent, simply gazing at the two traffickers.
Traffickers like these deserved to be dealt with harshly.
While they perhaps didn't need to be beaten straight to death, leaving them half-dead for the police to haul away was entirely acceptable.
Still, with the female host standing right beside him, it wouldn't do for him to nod and give people grounds for accusations.
Lin Zhang seemed to grasp Lin Xian's underlying intent. His face darkened, and he gave a sweeping wave of his hand.
"What—what are you people doing?! I broke the law! The law should handle this!" Liu Liang cried out in terror as the villagers swarmed forward.
Every single villager wore a menacing look on their face.
"Heh, now you know about the law? Too late!"
A burly man cracked his knuckles as he glared at Liu Liang.
"No... don't!"
Liu Liang shrieked in terror.
The next second, a crowd of people closed in around them.
From Liu Ruyan's angle, she could only see the wall of villagers; the two traffickers were completely blocked from view.
The netizens in the livestreaming room watched the scene unfold.
"Holy crap, what wonderfully rustic folkways!"
"Awesome! When they run into traffickers, they actually beat them to death!"
"Damn, there are ten thousand people watching this livestream right now—aren't they committing murder right in front of ten thousand people?"
"No matter how much the law can't punish the masses, doing this in front of so many witnesses means these villagers are totally screwed!"
"The problem is, this young man didn't nod! This can't be used as evidence against him."
Liu Ruyan was acutely aware of this fact as well. Lin Xian had never given the order for the villagers to beat the two traffickers to death.
Therefore, even if the traffickers died, the blame couldn't be pinned on Lin Xian.
But by now, saying anything was already too late.
From within the crowd, the continuous screams of Liu Liang and the other trafficker rang out.
The two men were clearly enduring a brutal beating at the hands of the villagers.
"What do you think you're doing? Stop this at once!" Lin Xian said, frowning.
Hearing Lin Xian utter those words, Liu Ruyan was struck dumb with astonishment.
Just like that, he had washed his hands clean of the whole affair?
No wonder he had been able to run roughshod over the village for all these years, committing countless crimes without ever being brought to justice.
The netizens in the livestreaming room were equally stunned by Lin Xian's shamelessness.
"Good grief, he just wiped his hands completely clean of it?"
"Incredible. No wonder he's committed so many crimes at such a young age and never gotten caught—truly legendary."
"Even though the guys he's beating are traffickers, it's still illegal. I wonder whose head they're going to pin this charge on."
The police officers keeping a constant eye on the livestream couldn't help but sigh in frustration at this turn of events.
"This kid actually knows how to avoid leaving behind any handle for the law."
"Yeah. Otherwise, this single incident alone would be more than enough to haul him in for questioning."
Zhao Guoan furrowed his brow as he stared at the screen.
"So cautious." Even though Liu Ruyan hadn't blown her cover, Lin Xian was still being this careful—truly living up to his reputation as someone who had committed so many crimes at a young age.
It looked like they weren't going to get any leads anytime soon.
Still, they had plenty of patience.
The rap sheet on this individual was enough to secure a massive promotion for an entire task force.
Back in Linjiacun Village.
The crowd gradually dispersed.
They revealed the two traffickers lying on the ground, their faces covered in blood.
Both men's faces were swollen into the shapes of pig heads and drenched in blood, their clothes shredded to pieces—a truly wretched sight.
Especially Liu Liang, the ringleader; everyone recognized him as the man who had been chatting with Lin Dahu earlier, the boss of the traffickers.
At this point, Liu Liang looked to be taking in far more air than he was expelling.
It was obvious he was on his last legs.
Just as Lin Xian stepped forward to speak, the man's eyes rolled back, and he drew his final breath.
The expressions of the surrounding villagers shifted slightly. Someone had died.
Even though these traffickers deserved to die a hundred times over, in this era of the rule of law, a life had been lost, and someone had to be held accountable.
Lin Xian stepped forward, reached out, and pressed his fingers against Liu Liang's wrist. His face darkened, and he let go of the wrist.
"He's dead," Lin Xian uttered the two words flatly.
He swept his gaze across the crowd.
"Our Linjiacun Village has always abided by the law, yet today, two illegal and criminal incidents have taken place right here," Lin Xian said with a dark expression, looking at the assembled villagers.
Young though he was, the aura he radiated caused every single Linjiacun Village resident present to lower their heads in silence.
Liu Ruyan covered her mouth as she stared at Liu Liang lying lifeless on the ground. A man had been beaten to death right before her very eyes.
Criminals or not, this was terrifyingly vicious.
The netizens in the livestreaming room were equally horrified by the actions of Linjiacun Village.
"Good lord, committing murder in broad daylight? This is completely insane!"
"Seriously! Aren't all these people going to be arrested?"
"Probably not. The law can't punish the entire village, and besides, I feel like human traffickers don't have human rights."
"True, but someone still has to take the blame for this."
"Anyway, I've already called the police. Heh, time to grab some popcorn."
"Holy shit, you called the cops? Didn't you just screw over Sister Ruyan?! You're a goddamn idiot!"
"So what? Someone was murdered, and you expect me not to call the police?"
"Screw your entire family!"
As Liu Ruyan watched the unfolding scene, just as she was agonizing over whether or not she should call the police herself,
In the distance, the wail of police sirens suddenly rang out.