There are quite a few mosquitoes in the mountains, and Fan Yi suffered quite a bit hiding up in the tree.
Those thirty-some remaining bandits seemed to have discovered the corpses of Big Bucktooth and the others; they all came running from the neighboring caves and gathered together. Lei Laohu, wearing a black hood, also walked out of Hidden Dragon Cave.
Fan Yi inwardly cursed his own lack of experience!
Having successfully cultivated to the Ninth Heaven of Dark Force, according to the two old men, he should have been at the very peak—if not peerless, then at least rarely matched in this world. It was precisely because of this that he had decided to come out and see the world, never expecting that the two old men's information was long outdated, and that other people weren't playing with Internal Force anymore, but practicing Qi Refining.
This just goes to show that building a carriage behind closed doors simply doesn't work.
At the same time, Fan Yi harbored great anticipation, wondering if obtaining the method of true qi cultivation would automatically make him a peak martial artist among mortals just like Internal Force had.
Putting aside young hero Fan Yi, who was both excited and nervous up in the tree:
Outside Hidden Dragon Cave, Lei Laohu was both shocked and furious.
What enraged him was that someone had committed murder right under his nose, which simply showed a total lack of respect for him.
What shocked him was his fear that government troops had tracked him down.
The psychology of someone like Lei Laohu, who had suddenly come into power, was very delicate.
On the one hand, he was extremely arrogant, always feeling that he had met the winds and clouds and transformed into a dragon; acting above everyone else, arrogant and presumptuous, was his true portrait.
On the other hand, this power after all came from illegitimate means and was nothing more than castles in the air; in his heart, he still felt somewhat guilty.
It was true that he was a bandit, but under the rule of Emperor Xia Hong, it wasn't all that easy to get by. Generally speaking, their strategy was: the enemy advances, we run; the enemy retreats, we run; the enemy camps, we run; the enemy tires, we run.
To put it simply, most bandits were spineless like this—the moment they spotted government troops, they ran.
Spine? Are you kidding me? Do you know how fierce those government troops are?
Over the years, Emperor Xia Hong frequently dispatched troops to beat up the various prairie states for no particular reason. There might not have been any major battles, but small-scale skirmishes had never stopped. These government troops were all retired soldiers!
This was also why Lei Laohu had felt such admiration upon seeing an immortal master single-handedly wipe out a squad of twenty government troops.
To say the least, if his own fifty-odd men had gone up against that squad of soldiers back then, they probably would have been finished in a single charge.
This was precisely why, as soon as Lei Laohu took power, he immediately changed locations. He figured that the death of twenty government troops would definitely blow up into a huge incident, and he wouldn't be able to handle it.
Events proved him right: just two days ago, Xuzhou had carried out a large-scale bandit suppression campaign, and those who ran too slowly had died most miserably.
Lei Laohu and the others had discussed it for a long time, and the majority of them leaned toward the idea that the government troops were coming and they should just run away. This left Lei Laohu extremely displeased, so he overrode everyone's objections, waved his hand grandly, and decided to dispatch five brothers to casually snatch a child and then run away.
The whole group was dumbfounded; this baffling operation left them completely baffled. But looking at their boss's increasingly bloodshot eyes, they decided to follow their hearts.
Thus, Lei Laohu reached out and pointed at five men, telling them to hurry off through the night to capture someone—it had to be alive!
The rest of the men hurriedly packed up their belongings and prepared to flee.
With the tasks assigned, Lei Laohu waved his hand to dismiss the meeting.
"Boss!" Suddenly, a lean man spoke up: "Our gang has already hit the four major wealthy families in Bailong Town recently, so their defenses are definitely heightened. Those five brothers who just went down might fail. Just to be safe, I'll take ten brothers to look for an opportunity in the two neighboring towns!"
The lean man puffed out his chest, signaling his utmost loyalty.
Lei Laohu found the lean man's two thin mustaches irritating, and coupled with the anxiety in his heart, he didn't think much further and told the lean man to pick his own people, but no matter what, he had to be back by tomorrow evening!
The lean man nodded with an expression of utmost sincerity and said yes.
Lei Laohu frowned, but finally couldn't help saying: "Go shave off those two little mustaches of yours—just looking at them drives me crazy!"
The lean man stared blankly as Lei Laohu turned and walked into the cave, a flash of dissatisfaction crossing his eyes. *Damn it, do you have any idea how much time I spend every single day trimming these two mustaches bit by bit with a broadsword?*
Putting that aside, the lean man selected ten men who were on good terms with him and headed down the mountain.
After some thought, Fan Yi decided to stay put and wait for an opportunity to finish off Lei Laohu.
The lean man and his ten subordinates caught up with the other five men at the foot of the mountain.
"Brothers!" the lean man said in a low voice: "You might not be able to tell, but I can—Rat and the others were shaken to death by someone using Dark Force!"
"Dark Force?!" the group gasped in unison.
Among the other five men, a one-eyed leader knitted his brows and said in a muffled voice: "Old Wolf, what are you trying to say?"
Old Wolf licked his lips: "Brothers, what do you say—how has Leopard Brother treated us? He's been more than fair! This Lei Laohu kills whoever he pleases and beats or scolds us at every turn. Besides, we men out making a living walk tall; in the past, despicable things like child-snatching that cut off one's lineage were things we wouldn't touch even if we bumped into them!"
"Get to the point!" The One-eyed Dragon looked at Old Wolf thoughtfully.
"Let's break away and go it alone!" Old Wolf said with high spirits: "Lei Laohu has definitely run into yamen runners or experts ready to make a move this time, yet he's still hounding us to go play child-snatchers, completely disregarding our lives."
Among the group, the men Old Wolf had brought down naturally agreed on the spot without a second thought. Only the One-eyed Dragon's faction hesitated.
Before long, the One-eyed Dragon also nodded fiercely: "Then tell me, where are we going?"
Seeing this, Old Wolf grinned: "No rush, no rush. There aren't many fools among those who make a living out here. Let's wait at the foot of the mountain for an hour first."
...
Outside Hidden Dragon Cave, Fan Yi jumped down from the tree with a bewildered look on his face.
"What's going on?"
Possessing sharp hearing and vision and occupying the high ground, Fan Yi discovered that apart from the two men called into the cave by Lei Laohu, everyone else had packed up their belongings and snuck down the mountain one by one.
Puzzled as he was, an opportunity still had to be seized. Fan Yi sneaked into the cave.
It was already late, and inside the cave you couldn't even see your hand in front of your face. However, Fan Yi, with his formidable cultivation, was still able to make out his direction with the aid of a faint glimmer of light.
Hidden Dragon Cave was quite deep. After walking for a while, Fan Yi saw a bright light coming from around a corner.
He moved even more cautiously, then carefully poked his head out. The bizarre scene inside sent a chill running through Fan Yi.
One low-level bandit held a lantern with vacant, unmoving eyes—who knew if his eyes felt dry.
As for the other bandit, his throat had been slashed open by Lei Laohu, and the gushing fresh blood was being evenly poured by Lei Laohu into five large pits. A dark red formation diagram connected the five blood pits, and at the center of the formation was a scarlet vertical eye.
Fan Yi looked toward the vertical eye, only to feel a strange suction force wash over him that made his mind and soul shake! The breathing rhythm he was using to conceal his aura was interrupted right then and there.
Inside, Lei Laohu, who was holding two unconscious children in each of his hands, immediately dropped the children he was holding and let out a furious roar: "Who's there?!"
Then his entire body charged over like a maddened wild bull.
After dismissing the men down the mountain, Lei Laohu had been feeling restless all along, and finally decided to use the blood of a low-ranking bandit first to complete the sacrificial ritual!
Yet who would have expected that just as he turned around and brought those children out from the cave, he would hear a prolonged breathing sound, causing him to instantly break out in a cold sweat and launch a ferocious attack!
Whoever you are, you're dead for sure today!