Chapter - 39 Boundless Desert (8) (2/2)
Pulling Guo Jing behind him with his left hand, he sneered: ”Bullying a little kid, have you no shame?”
The soldiers immediately readied their spears and surrounded Jebe. Seeing that he had nowhere to run, Jebe tossed aside the broken saber. Jochi charged at him and landed a punch on his chest with Jebe not even trying to protect himself.
”Kill me now!” He shouted, but then he added with in a quiet and heavy voice: ”Pity that I cannot die at the hands of a true hero!”
”What did you say?” Temujin cut in.
”To die on the battlefields, at hands of the hero that beat me, is dying with no regrets. But today the eagle has fallen onto the ground and was bitten to death by ants!” Jebe replied with fury in his eyes and let out a tremendous howl. Chagatai's hunting dogs, who had collectively pinned Guo Jing's shepherd dog onto the ground and were relentlessly biting it, jumped at the howl and ran away whimpering behind their trainers.
”Khan, don't let this little bastard boast like that.” A person stepped out from beside Temujin and shouted. ”Let me duel with him!”
”Alright, have a duel with him.” Temujin replied, happily discovering that the man was Bogurchi. ”We don't have much of anything else, but we do have some heroes.”
”I'm going to kill you by myself, so that you can die with no regrets.” Bogurchi took a few steps forward and shouted at Jebe.
”Who the hell are you?” Jebe shouted back, noticing that the challenger was very well built and had a very deep and loud voice.
”I'm Bogurchi! Heard of me before?”
A cold feeling shot through Jebe's heart: ”So this is him; rumors say that Bogurchi is the hero of heroes among the Mongols.” Not wanting to reply, he simply shot a sideways look and hmmphed.
”You boast about your skills with the bow and arrow, and others even call you Jebe. Why don't you and this friend of mine have a little shooting contest?” Temujin declared. In Mongolian, ”Jebe” means both ”arrow” and ”divine archer.” Jebe had another name, but because of his incredible skill with the bow and arrow, everyone called him Jebe and his real name had long been forgotten.
[Note: According to Mongol records, when he first entered Temujin's tribe, Jebe gave his name as Jirgadei.]
”So you are a friend of his?” Jebe shouted at Bogurchi. ”Then I guess I'll kill you first.”
This remark caused all of the Mongol soldiers to let out an audible laugh, for everyone of them knew that Bogurchi was unbeatable as a fighter and was famous through out the entire Steppe. Even though they saw how great Jebe was with the bow, claiming to be able to kill Bogurchi was just a bit too much for them to stomach.