The River Bandits

The boat groaned. The lake stretched black under a dying sun. Around them, small sampans emerged from the reeds like waterlogged teeth—each one packed with figures holding hooks, knives, and bows.

“River bandits,” Li Huowang said.

It was a trap. A simple, brutal one: lure everyone onto the water, then take everything.

He let out a short breath. “Charming folk around here.”

He noticed the bandits weren’t all men in their prime. There were old women, children, teenagers. A family business, it seemed. Generational.

A crossbow bolt thudded into the gunwale. The passengers—dozens of them—pressed against each other, trembling.

“Listen up, folks!” the head bandit called from his sampan. “You toss your luggage, your jewelry, your coins into the water, and we, the righteous heroes of Hengshan Lake, won’t lift a finger against you.”

“But if we find so much as a single copper you’ve hidden… hm hm. Then you get to choose: boiled knife-cut noodles or wonton soup.”

The threat rippled through the crowd. Bags hit the water. Luggage splashed and sank.

On the road you could run from bandits. Here, in the middle of a lake, you just took the loss. Even if you jumped, you’d never outswim them.

Li Huowang watched the sampans circle. He stepped forward.

“Friend,” he said to the head bandit. “Take us to shore, and I’ll pretend none of this happened.”

The head bandit frowned, sizing him up again. “Shoulder to shoulder, let’s hear your name, eh?”

“Speak plainly,” Li Huowang said, irritation creeping in. “Take us to shore.”

“Hey, boys! Look at this—a newborn chick who doesn’t know the score! Maybe the fuzz hasn’t even come in yet! Hahahaha!”

The bandits roared with laughter.

“Kid, you think being a Daoist means anything? I’ve cut down eight of your kind already!”

“Let me tell you—on this lake, you’re in the Yuan family’s territory. A dragon coils. A tiger crawls. Even if the Heavenly King himself showed up, he’d pay the toll!”

The head bandit’s speech drew cheers and whistles. The bandits were already dividing the spoils in their heads.

“Dad! I want the white-haired girl for a wife! She’s pretty!”

“No. You can play with her, but she’s useless as a wife. I don’t want my grandson born looking like a freak.”

“Then I’ll let you have her first, Dad. When you’re done, I’ll take her.”

“Ha! Good son. Filial.”

Shrill ringing split the air, making the lake’s surface quiver.

Li Huowang’s eyes hardened. He pulled a packet of dirt from his bag and tipped it into his mouth.

“Chān lǔ jiù!”

The Wandering Lord took shape instantly, slithering across the water toward the sampans.

The bandits panicked. They shot arrows, swung blades. None of it mattered.

Any body the Wandering Lord passed through went stiff, then pitched into the water.

Soon, more than a dozen corpses floated on the surface.

The bandits realized too late what they had provoked. Screaming, they threw themselves into the lake, swimming for their lives.

“Brother Li! The boat’s leaking! There are water ghosts under the hull!”

Li Huowang guided the Wandering Lord with his fingers. It dove, and moments later, naked upper bodies surfaced one after another—dead.

In the chaos, the surviving bandits had scattered. Only the unmanned sampans and drifting bodies remained.

But the trouble wasn’t over.

“Bail the water out! Use your clothes to plug the holes!” Li Huowang shouted.

If the boat sank here, even the Wandering Lord couldn’t save him.

They scrambled. They bailed. They stuffed fabric into the breaches. Finally, the leak was contained.

Before Li Huowang could catch his breath, Bai Lingmiao tugged his sleeve. She pointed at the distant reeds.

Under a red sun, the sampans were re-emerging. The men on them had reddened eyes fixed on the dozens of bodies in the water.

An old man, white-haired and hunched, stood at the front, supported by the head bandit. His voice trembled with age but carried far.

“Master… that’s dozens of lives from the Yuan family. If you’d called your name earlier, we crude folk wouldn’t have dared to block you. Or… did you just want to see blood today?”

Li Huowang ignored him. He turned to his group. “Who here is a good swimmer? Go fetch that bamboo pole.”

The boat had to move. Staying still in the middle of the lake—especially as night fell—was not an option.

The old man’s voice turned sharp with grief. “What’s done is done. Our lives are cheap. But no one—no one—kills this many Yuan family members and walks away easily!”

Something about the old man’s tone made Li Huowang pause. But the light was fading, and the distance was too great to see clearly.

“Anyone with sharp eyes,” he said. “Tell me what they’re doing.”

He couldn’t afford to let his guard down. In this place, caution was survival.

The one-armed man squinted hard. Opening and closing his eyes for a long moment, he finally spoke. “Looks like… they’re kowtowing. Performing some kind of rite. High rank, too—using three sacrificial animals. Oh, damn! The old man just threw two infants into the water!”

Li Huowang’s heart tightened. He raised his bell and shook it again.

Whatever they were doing, it was wrong. He couldn’t afford to save three months of life right now.

The Wandering Lord shot forward at tremendous speed—then stopped mid-way. It turned back.

Before Li Huowang could react, the entire ship shuddered. From below came the creak of wood under immense strain.

“Something is under us!”

With a deafening crack, the ship was hurled upward by a titanic force from below, then slammed back onto the lake.

The old vessel, already worn, couldn’t take it. It broke apart.

Li Huowang tumbled into the icy water. The cold hit him like a slap. He gasped and forced his eyes open.

In the dark, churning mud of the lakebed, something vast was stirring.

And then—seven monstrous eyes, flickering with an unnatural, shifting light, snapped open in unison, staring straight at him.