114 Guests (1/2)

The teenagers stopped at the top of the slope and paused for a while so they could observe the situation in front of them. After that, they galloped toward the three riders.

When they were about 100 steps away from the riders, one rider suddenly shot an arrow into the ground ahead of them to warn them not to approach anymore.

Gu Shenwei took Liuhua's longbow and shot an arrow into the air.

He had received some training in archery. Although he was not a very good archer, he could still use an arrow to deliver something to the riders.

He had chopped off four fingers of the woman dressed in a black robe and carried all those fingers with him. He tied one of the fingers to the arrowhead and shot it out with the arrow.

A rider raised his hand to catch the arrow. He was shocked when he saw the finger on it. Affected by his mood, his horse began to neigh and bolt. The other two horses were also startled. The three riders immediately pulled their reins, trying to calm down their horses.

Right at this moment, an arrow suddenly flew out from a shrub on their left side and shot a rider down.

The two remaining riders hurriedly took out their arrows. However, before they could nock them, they were already hit by arrows and fell off their horses.

The next moment, Liuhua came out of the shrub and shot an arrow into each dead rider's mouth. This was the mark he left on everyone that he killed.

Killers only launched attacks from the side or the back of their enemies. Before the other three teenagers had appeared on the top of the slope to attract the riders' attention, Liuhua had dismounted from his horse and had sneaked all the way up to the riders. Although this place did not have any lush and tall vegetation, the dense grass and bushes still screened his movements very well.

The three riders had apparently underestimated these teenagers and thus had forgotten to guard against flanking and rear attacks.

Now, the four brown-belt assassins went to check the three dead bodies. Unfortunately, they did not find anything which could determine the riders' identities.

Gu Shenwei started to miss Tie Hanfeng. ”That old cripple has extensive experience. He must have some knowledge of who they are.”

Fang Wenshi finally caught up with the brown-belt assassins. He looked at the teenagers and the dead riders on the ground, nodding vigorously. ”That's awesome. You really impressed me.”

”You should keep going forward,” Gu Shenwei mounted his horse and said to the scholar.

”No, you want to use me as bait. I won't go first,” Fang Wenshi replied while shaking his head vigorously.

”You should be glad that you're still useful to us,” Gu Shenwei said while holding his saber shaft.

Fang Wenshi's face suddenly changed. ”I'm a very useful person. I'm excellent at astronomy and geography. I know the political situation in the Western Region and the tensions between the countries very well. I even know the local specialties of all the places in this region clearly. I'm an excellent counselor. It's a waste to use me as bait.”

When the scholar was talking on and on, boasting of his talents and expertise, a troop was rapidly approaching them. It seemed to be a large troop. They could see the dust rising to the clouds in the distance.

”Counselor, what should we do now?” Gu Shenwei asked sarcastically.

Fang Wenshi did not seem to notice the teenager's ironic tone and replied seriously, ”I've never learned Guiguzi and Sun Zi's military tactics. What I've learned is the strategies of Su Qin and Zhang Yi. Despite that, I can still give you a suggestion on the current situation. Look, there are probably nearly a thousand soldiers coming toward us, but we had only four killers. If we don't run away as soon as possible, we'll be dead when they start to shoot arrows at us.”

With these words, the scholar turned his horse around and galloped away. When he arrived at the top of another slope, he stopped and looked back. He found out that the teenagers did not move at all and felt very confused.

When the troop came near, the teenagers discovered that it was not a large troop at all. There were only about 30 people in the troop. Their leaders were five people dressed in black robes just like the woman they had encountered last night.

”Go south!” A rider galloped ahead of the troop and shouted to the teenagers.

Gu Shenwei was determined to go forward. He refused to turn around or turn to the south, for he was sure that he would never get what he wanted in the desert.

He waved to Liuhua.

Liuhua drew his longbow and shot an arrow.

The rider reacted quickly and drew his bow almost at the same time to aim and shoot. His arrow precisely blocked Liuhua's arrow, but he still fell off his saddle with a cry.

Liuhua had shot two arrows at a time, but the rider had only succeeded in blocking one of them.

The troop now realized that these four teenagers were not ordinary travelers, but they did not attack the boys when they significantly outnumbered them. Instead, the troop started to retreat in an orderly manner.

The brown-belt assassins followed the troop from a distance. Soon they saw another troop consisting of about 70 people one or two kilometers ahead of them. That troop had set some antler railings over there to block the road. This roadblock was located right between two high hills. If they wanted to move forward, they had no choice but to break through this block.

Behind the antler railings stood three rows of bowman.

Gu Shenwei led his brown-belt assassins to retreat a few kilometers. When they stopped, he ordered his assassins to arrange the horses into a circle for them to sit inside and take turns to have some sleep. He also shared some of their water and dried food with the horses.

Killers usually launched their attacks at night, so Liuhua, Snowcamel and Wildhorse all considered it quite normal to have some rest now so they took turns to sleep. They were waiting for the night to fall.

Gu Shenwei could not sleep. He thought about the woman's words again and again. ”We don't want your goods. We want the person.”