42 PRICELESS TREASURE (1/2)
”Sigh...” Kunzi resisted the urge to kick his fellow bandits to oblivion. Grasping onto the hope that perhaps he could still salvage the situation if he successfully completed he robbery, his attention finally turned to his two victims. One, the purple-haired girl, was looking at him with a wary gaze full of killing intent. For some reason, hefelt a shiver go down his spine as he stared into her emerald eyes, so he chose to approach the golden-eyed child instead. He seemed much more harmless, with his curious countenance and the perennial smile plastered on his face...
”You two! Pay up. Now,” he rotated his cultivation base, making his robes flutter intimidatingly in the process. ”Or I'll get angry. You two wouldn't want to make me angry, would you?”
Being the one that Kunzi guy had spoken to, Cheng Hao pondered for some time on what he should do. Eventually, he came to the conclusion... that a little bit of extra spare change would never hurt.
He shook his head with a chuckle, ”Make you angry? Oh, of course not, senior! We were only thinking that we had picked the wrong road! Could we perhaps... turn back and leave?”
”Turn back... and leave?” The hooded cultivator was taken by surprise. He turned around, glancingat his companions and broke into laughter. ”Heard that? The kid wants to leave!”
Cheng Hao's smile widened imperceptibly, ”Does that mean... you won't allow us to leave?”
The hooded cultivator paused for a bit. Then, as if he had realized something, he waved his hand reassuringly, ”Well... of course you can! However... Eh!”
With a snap of his fingers, the nine other Vacant Disciples edged closer. Although awakwardly, they still managedto completely surround Cheng Hao and Xiao Wu. ”You see, in that case... we might have to take a little extra payment!”
The golden-eyed youth raised an eyebrow. Then, his gaze turned from the group of the closing-in bandits, to a white-robed old man in the distance, at the entry of the bazaar. He had a single black stripe running down from his left shoulder to his right: he was a Vacant Elder, an administrator of justice within the Vacant Sect! At the moment however, he seemed to be ignoring the hooded men's actions, as if he were used to it and could not be bothered to take action. Seeing this, Cheng Hao's smile grew slightly wider. ”Mmm...” He stroked his chin in a pensive manner beforehe announced, ”I guess I'll take the third option then.”
The boy stepped forward, placing himself in between the attackers and Xiao Wu. Then, with a smug smile, he pointed at the distant, white-robed figure, ”I'll be asking that Elder over there to uphold justice and take action!”
”Pff-! Bwahahah!”
”He's going to ask Old Ji to help out? Ahahah... That's hilarious, kid!”
HearingCheng Hao's words , the bandits couldn't help laughing and mocking the youth: Old Ji, the Vacant Elder standing by the gate and whom Cheng Hao was pointing at, had been a collaborator of theirs for many months now... In exchange for a small percentage of their gains, he would turn a blind eye to their wrongdoings. After all, there was no such thing as a Sect Rule that prevented disciples from fighting each other! As far as the Vacant Sect was concerned, although killing would not go completely unpunished, robbing could be overlooked. With enough incentive, that was even the more so!
However, it was at this moment, when the ten robbers were chuckling and joking around, and most importantly after Kunzi had finally dropped his guard, that Cheng Hao made his move.
He moved so fast that he seemed not to have left at all, his afterimage only disappearing when he had long since appeared right beside the leader of the hooded men. Standing outside an encirclement of nine adult cultivators, Kunzi's eyes widened as he saw a golden-eyed ghost materializing in his field of vision. Fluctuations of a mighty cultivation base battered against his consciousness, causing him to feel slightly dizzy. This lasted only for the fraction of a second, but it was enough to paralyze the early Basic Stage cultivator long enough for Cheng Hao to easily grab his arm and align Kunzi's blade with another hooded man's back...
At this moment, everyone was still staring slack-jawed at the stop where a person had just disappeared, wondering if their eyes were deceiving them, unaware of what was going on behind them. Then, a child's innocent and frightened voice rang out.
”Uh? Sir, what are you doing? Sir, stop! Don't do it!” and just as Cheng Hao said that, he gave the arm holding the weapon a light push...
Stab.
In his daze induced by the earlier crashes of cultivation bases, early Basic Stage cultivator Kunzi could only look on in horror as his blade slowly embedded itself in his comrade's stomach. He was on the verge of letting go of the blade when, suddenly, he felt someone was firmly grabbing his wrist. He turned to look, startled, only to find a golden-eyed youth smiling back at him. That smile, completely devoid of guilt, carrying within it the innocence of an unassuming youth, sent chills down the bandit leader's spine.
The sound of a blade biting into the flesh was like that of a cannonball, causing everyone's eyes to immediately dart over. There, one of the cloaked bandits was standing on shaky legs, staring disbelief at the tip of the blade coming out of his abdomen! Unable to believe what had just happened, the hooded man coughed a mouthful of blood and fell on his knees, the tinges of pain from the edge still inside his body making him feel unable to breathe. He turned around with gritted teeth, but immediately the rage, fury and desperation in his eyes widened in confusion.
”K-Kunzi... Why did you...”
”Eeek! Sir! Stop!” together with the child's painfully fake shouts, Kunzi felt his arm continue on forward, delving even deeper into his comrades's flesh...
”Cough!”
Another mouthful of blood dyed the ground red!
”No... NO! LET GO OF ME!” He made to shake off the youth's grip, only to find that... he couldn't! Cheng Hao's hands were clamping down firmly around his wrist, and no matter how much force Kunzi applied, the child would not budge!
In that moment, had he let go of the blade instead, he probably would have been able to delay the situation a little while longer. However, Cheng Hao's weak-looking frame, that of an eight-year old child, had driven Kunzi into a trap: instinctively thinking he would easily be able to shake off that grip, Kunzi had not spared a thought to releasing the weapon in his hand, all to focus on freeing himself from the youth's clutches first! However, Cheng Hao's grip... was backed up by the rotations of the Pseudo-Core in his Sea of Consciousness! It was powered by a Pseudo-Advanced Stage cultivation!
Slowly, the blade slid out of the wounded cultivator's chest. Then, with another pull, Kunzi found the blade he was holding to be once more on the verge of striking out, aligned with the kneeling man's neck!
And he, as a mere Basic stage cultivator in the face of a Pseudo-Advanced Stage cultivator, could only watch as, with a second tug of the child's wrist, the blade began to slowly inch forward...
”Sir! Don't! You'll KILL him!”
”NONONO- STOP, FOR GOODNESS' SAKE, STOP YOU MONSTER!!!”
It was only with Kunzi's cry that the shortsword slowly came to a stop, resting just a few millimeters away from the hooded bandit's jugular.
”Ah...” This time around, no sound was able to escape the kneeling man's lips. Together with the relief of having his life spared, a sensation of warmth at his crotch was all that accompanied him as everything went black and he passed out.
The silence that ensued was only broken by the voice of a child, of a young boy screaming at the top of his lungs, ”Murderer! He killed him! There's a murderer in the Sect! Esteemed Elder, help! He's trying to murder us!”
Kunzi watched on blankly, his face devoid of any expression. Then, his gaze slowly grew clear and his eyes turned red as he understood: in front of him was a wounded person, in his hands was a blood-stainedweapon... and behind him was a child screaming to the world that he was a murderer!