The Outlaw’s Den

Chapter 191: Bandits

Watching the man roll on the ground, clutching his ear and shrieking, Li Huowang couldn't be bothered with more words.

He just raised his longsword, ready to cut the bastard’s head off.

“Senior Brother Li! Look at this!”

The sudden voice stopped Li Huowang. Sun Baolu was walking over, holding something in his hand. Li Huowang looked—and saw it was a worn, polished old tobacco pipe.

And the pipe, along with the pattern on the attached tobacco pouch, looked awfully familiar.

“Senior Brother Li, this is Troupe Master Lü’s pipe! I’m certain of it. When we traveled together, he even lent it to me a few times.”

Li Huowang took it, turning it over in his hands. His face grew serious.

So in all likelihood, Troupe Master Lü had been captured by these bandits.

He dangled the pipe in front of the bandit on the ground. His voice turned cold. “Where did you get this? Did your crew rob a traveling opera troupe recently?”

“Go ahead and kill me if you’ve got the stones! I, Liu Waizui, am an upright man! You think I’d sell out my brothers?” The bandit sneered at Li Huowang, his face full of brazen defiance.

Seeing that expression, a surge of heat rushed to Li Huowang’s head. He smiled. He undid the clasp on the sheepskin pouch hanging from the lower edge of his robe.

A clatter of metal. Laid out before him was a row of meticulously cleaned torture implements, each one a different shape.

“Kill you? That’d be too easy for you.”

For the next little while, Liu Waizui had his fingers ground away, one inch at a time, one joint at a time. His screams carried far across the rocky mountain.

The others all turned their heads away, unable to bear watching any longer.

By the time his left hand was ground down to just the wrist, his face a mess of tears and snot, he finally broke and confessed everything.

“I’ll talk! I’ll talk! A few days ago, the big boss’s old mother celebrated her seventieth birthday! He specially grabbed an opera troupe! They’re still up on the mountain!”

Li Huowang casually tossed the blood-soaked implement in front of him. Liu Waizui flinched backward in terror.

“Get up. If you don’t want more pain, take me to your stronghold.”

Liu Waizui didn’t dare argue anymore. He scrambled to his feet like a beaten dog and started leading the way.

Beside him, Sun Baolu, who had been wiping the blood off his sword on a corpse, spoke with some hesitation. “Senior Brother Li, maybe we should let it go. It’s less trouble if we don’t get involved. Troupe Master Lü isn’t a relative or close friend…”

When he caught the sharp glare in Li Huowang’s eyes, he looked away.

“I am Li Huowang. Not Danyangzi. If I hadn’t known, fine. But since I know Troupe Master Lü has been taken, I have to find a way to get him back!”

“Besides, these scumbags attacked us without a word. I’m going to have words with them too.”

If even a pack of common bandits could push him around whenever they pleased—if he let that slide—then living would just be too damn stifling.

There were things in this world he couldn’t afford to mess with. But there were also things he could.

The wagon turned, following Liu Waizui toward the bandit stronghold.

“May the journey treat you well, true person. We’ll meet again should fate allow.”

The voice came from behind. Li Huowang turned and saw it was the old man who had been traveling with them. He had already climbed past the blocking rocks.

Li Huowang gave a casual cupped-fist salute, then turned back and kept walking.

The old man who had just been sharing the road was already forgotten. All of Li Huowang’s attention was focused on what was coming next.

Through Liu Waizui’s stammering account, Li Huowang quickly learned the shape of this bandit crew.

Their leader’s outlaw title was Big Golden Dragon. This stretch of Manzi Mountain was his territory.

They weren’t roving bandits. This was an established outlaw nest with a full Four Beams and Eight Pillars structure.

“What’s ‘Four Beams and Eight Pillars’?” Li Huowang asked as they walked.

From Liu Waizui’s mouth, he heard a whole string of titles.

But when you boiled it down, they were just the different roles in a bandit den.

The “Blade-Head”—the ones who did the raiding and killing. The “Grain-Terrace”—who managed supplies. The “Water-Fragrance”—who handled the lookouts and sentries inside the stronghold. The “Tumble-Stacker”—the strategist who planned the jobs. The “Seedling-Room”—who guarded the rich hostages brought up the mountain. The “Tongue-Man”—who intimidated the hostages’ families into paying ransoms. The “Insert-Thousand”—who disguised themselves as commoners to scout for information. And finally, the “Word-Craftsman”—who wrote the ransom letters and handled other clerical business.

First came the Big Boss, the Second Boss, the Third Boss. Then these Four Beams and Eight Pillars. Then, at the bottom, the grunt “cubs” who did the miscellaneous labor.

The entire outlaw nest was structured like a pyramid—clear ranks, easy to see at a glance.

“Just a bunch of bandits, but you’re organized like a military camp. How many men do you have?”

“Never counted. A few hundred, probably.”

Liu Waizui was completely broken. He spoke like a beaten dog, answering whatever he was asked.

“How capable is your big boss? Does he have any supernatural powers?”

“No powers. The big boss is just a big guy. His weapon’s a maul.”

“A few hundred men. No supernatural powers. Just ordinary bandits…” Li Huowang silently calculated the balance of forces.

They had come on horseback. Li Huowang was on foot. By the time they neared the outlaw’s den, the sky was almost dark.

Soon, Li Huowang and his people were climbing the mountain. He could see torchlight halfway up the slope. That should be their destination.

A crisp birdsong came from a nearby hillside.

Li Huowang kicked Liu Waizui in the ass. “Tell them I’m here to ‘shout the mountain’—we can sit down and talk this out peacefully, or we can settle it with steel. You’ve seen what I can do. Think about how many of your people would have to die if it comes to a fight.”

Holding his mangled hand, Liu Waizui nodded dejectedly. He pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth and whistled.

The same birdsong came out of his mouth.

Soon, a matching birdsong answered.

The path ahead was clear. No one stopped them.

Before long, a cave entrance appeared on the mountainside in front of him. A few fierce-looking bandits stood at the mouth holding torches, glaring at Li Huowang.

“You’ve got guts, boy. You kill our brothers and still dare to come ‘shout the mountain’!”

Li Huowang couldn’t be bothered to bandy words with common mountain bandits. He just walked straight in.

Inside the so-called Hall of Assembly, he saw three rough men drinking and eating meat, cursing and laughing in a stream of foul language.

The noise gradually died down. All three of them turned to size him up.

“尖局化把子？还是里腥化把子啊?” (A real Daoist? Or a fake one?”) A bald-headed man was the first to speak.

But Li Huowang had no patience for their cant.

“Since I’m here, I’m sure you gentlemen understand the situation. Hand over the opera troupe, and we’ll call what happened in the canyon settled.”

“Hahaha!” The three of them burst out laughing together.

Clang! The blade slid from its sheath, and thick killing intent flooded the entire hall.