After leaving the Dragon Gate Inn, the glittering carriage did not hurry on its way.
Instead, it stopped beside a broad official road.
“Dad, wait here for a moment. I’m going to upgrade our ride.”
Su Yaoyao climbed onto the roof using both hands and feet, moving with ease along the carriage frame.
Below, Su Zhen stood with his head tilted back, watching his daughter tinker with the carriage, his face full of curiosity.
Su Yaoyao reached casually into the air, and her personal storage space opened.
Two enormous black metal cylinders with exaggerated designs and a heavy industrial style appeared out of thin air on the roof.
These were no ordinary objects.
They were high-lumen industrial searchlights designed for nighttime asteroid-mining operations. Each came equipped with a high-capacity power cell, and their penetrating beams were astonishingly powerful.
In an ancient night untouched by light pollution, their beams could pierce through the darkness for more than ten miles—not to mention that they could even cut through a sandstorm.
Humming a little tune, Su Yaoyao pulled several thick nylon cable ties from her storage space.
With practiced movements, she fastened the two enormous searchlights to either side of the carriage roof.
Then she connected the power cables and routed the switch to the driver’s seat.
“Done!”
Su Yaoyao dusted off her hands and jumped down from the roof.
Su Zhen walked around the carriage, staring at the two dark metal cylinders overhead with a baffled expression.
“Daughter, what are you doing with those two giant tubes? Are you planning to use them as cannons?”
Su Yaoyao gave him a mysterious smile, reached out, and gently pressed the red switch beside the seat.
Snap!
A crisp electrical hum rang out.
Two thick beams of pure white, blinding light burst forth like a pair of swords tearing through the void!
The beams were like two suns crashing down into the mortal world, shooting straight into the heavens.
The day had still been fairly bright, but beneath the brilliance of these two high-tech light sources, even daylight seemed dim.
The dazzling beams swept across the forest ahead, illuminating the dark woods so thoroughly that the texture of every leaf could be seen in perfect detail.
The carriage was already covered in pure gold foil. Under the reflection of the searchlights, it now radiated a dazzling golden glow.
The entire carriage had transformed into a blinding object of light—
like a moving mountain of gold, burning madly and seemingly determined to blind everyone who looked at it.
Caught off guard, Su Zhen shielded his face with his sleeve as the powerful light flashed across his eyes.
“Oh, heavens! What kind of magical treasure is this? It’s a million times brighter than the luminous pearls in my imperial palace!”
Su Yaoyao lifted her chin proudly and planted her hands on her hips.
“Dad, didn’t the innkeeper say the bandits in Hell King’s Gorge have their eyes on us?”
“Not only can we not hide, we have to swagger right past them.”
“I added these two searchlights precisely because I was worried their eyesight might be too poor and they’d miss this huge payday!”
Su Zhen immediately understood his daughter’s wicked plan.
He threw back his head and laughed heartily, clapping his hands in approval.
“Excellent! What a wonderful way to make sure they don’t miss us! You really are my daughter—bold and outrageous. I like it!”
“Come on! Get in the carriage! Let’s go meet the largest bandit force in all of Great Yan!”
Su Zhen had already made plans for how he would get his daughter and himself away unharmed should anything go wrong.
Father and daughter climbed back into the carriage.
With a crack of the whip, this golden treasury—practically a moving sun—set off toward Hell King’s Gorge in full view of everyone.
Its wheels rumbled as it made a grand spectacle of itself all the way down the road.
By dusk, the sky had begun to darken.
That was when the searchlights truly displayed their full power.
For more than a dozen miles in every direction, people could see a huge beam of light moving along the official road.
At that moment, in a dense patch of grass five miles from the entrance to Hell King’s Gorge, two outer sentries from Hell King’s Stronghold lay in the mud, dressed in camouflage made of grass and leaves, bored out of their minds as they kept watch.
One was called Skinny Monkey, and the other was One-Eye.
Both were skilled scouts of the stronghold.
“Monkey, do you think the innkeeper’s message was reliable?” One-Eye asked in a low voice, chewing on a blade of grass.
“She said a carriage covered in gold foil would be passing by. In times like these, could there really be such a foolish, fat sheep?”
Skinny Monkey rolled his eyes and was just about to answer when the corner of his eye suddenly caught something strange.
A bright point of light had appeared on the distant horizon.
It was moving quickly, growing brighter and more dazzling by the second.
“One—One-Eye… what in the world is that over there?” Skinny Monkey’s voice trembled.
One-Eye followed the direction of his finger.
The instant he looked, his one eye widened so far it nearly fell out, his pupil contracting violently.
That wasn’t a point of light at all!
It was a terrifying beam bright enough to blind anyone who looked at it!
In an ancient night when people were reluctant to burn even an extra oil lamp, how could they possibly have seen the power of an industrial LED searchlight?
The intense beam swept over them like a shock wave.
It passed directly over the patch of grass where they were hiding.
“Ah! My eyes! I can’t see! I’m blind!”
Skinny Monkey let out a shriek and clutched at his eyes, rolling around in agony.
The light had burned his retinas. All he could see now was a glaring white haze.
One-Eye was no better off.
Tears streamed from his only eye, which burned fiercely. He couldn’t see a thing.
“Divine punishment! The heavens have sent down divine light!”
“The gods have manifested! Run! Get back to the stronghold and report to the Chief!”
The two elite sentries, who were supposed to ambush the carriage from the shadows, didn’t even bother to retrieve their weapons.
Like two headless chickens, they scrambled and stumbled out of the grass, then ran wildly down the path toward the depths of Hell King’s Gorge.
Half an hour later.
Deep inside Hell King’s Gorge, in the great assembly hall of Hell King’s Stronghold—
The terrain here was treacherous, easy to defend and difficult to attack. Terrifying animal bones and skulls hung along both sides of the hall, displaying the bandits’ brutality.
The Chief of Hell King’s Stronghold sat astride a chair draped in tiger hide.
He was eight feet tall, with muscles bulging across his powerful frame. In one hand, he held a wine bowl carved from a human skull, gulping down strong liquor.
At that moment, two figures came stumbling through the entrance of the hall.
They were Skinny Monkey and One-Eye, their eyes swollen and red, tears streaming down their faces.
“Chief! This is bad! This is very bad!”
Skinny Monkey dropped to his knees with a thud. His voice had become shrill with terror.
The Chief frowned and slammed the skull-shaped wine bowl onto the table.
“What are you panicking about? Even if the sky falls, I’ll hold it up! Speak! Has that fat sheep from the Dragon Gate Inn arrived?”
One-Eye kowtowed repeatedly and hurriedly reported, “It has! But, Chief, that isn’t an ordinary fat sheep!”
“That’s a mountain! A mountain of gold that can move and glow!”
The Chief was utterly confused.
“What do you mean, a glowing mountain of gold? Get your tongue straight and explain yourself!”
Skinny Monkey rushed to describe what they had seen.
“Chief, we saw it with our own eyes. The carriage wasn’t just covered in gold—the roof also had two peerless divine pearls embedded in it, each brighter than the sun!”
“The light from those divine pearls illuminated half the sky. Even from several miles away, it was bright enough to blind anyone who looked at it!”
The moment the Chief heard the words “peerless divine pearls,” a greedy glint shot through his eyes.
A luminous pearl capable of lighting up half the sky—how enormous must it be?!
If he seized it and offered it to the emperor of Great Yan, then forget remaining a bandit. He might even be granted a noble title and appointed to high office!
“A moving treasury that glows…”
The Chief was so excited that his whole body trembled. He rose to his feet and slapped his thigh hard.
The sharp crack echoed through the Hall of Heroes.
“Good! Excellent! The heavens really are smiling on us. They’ve actually delivered such a huge fortune right to the gates of Yama Stronghold!”
The Chief snatched up the nine-ringed broadsword beside him, a weapon weighing over a hundred pounds, and threw back his head with a booming laugh.
“Brothers! Once we finish this job, we’ll eat the finest food and drink the best liquor! Even the treasury of the Great Yan Empire would be ours for the taking!”
“Pass down my order! Sound the muster drum!”
“Rally all three thousand brothers, grab your weapons, and send everyone out!”
“Block the entrance to the gorge! Don’t let even a single fly escape!”
At the Chief’s command, the entire Yama Stronghold erupted into motion.
The deep, thunderous beat of the muster drum rolled through the mountains.
Three thousand hardened bandits armed with broadswords and spears surged out from every direction like a swarm of locusts.
They raised their torches, forming a long, winding fire dragon as they charged toward the entrance of Yama Gorge, overflowing with murderous intent.
Every one of them was already dreaming of the mountains of gold and silver soon to be theirs.
The Chief led the charge, carrying his nine-ringed broadsword on his shoulder. He swore he would personally seize this staggering fortune.
At the entrance to the gorge, cliffs soared into the clouds on either side, leaving only a narrow passage between them.
It was truly a place where one man could hold the pass against ten thousand.
Three thousand burly men packed the passage so tightly that not even water could pass through. Their countless torches dyed the night sky a fiery red.
Just as they had finished forming up, a steady, unhurried rumble of horse hooves came from the official road ahead of the gorge.
Two blinding beams of pure white light, so dazzling that no one could look directly at them, swept into the gorge like swords wielded by the gods.
In the face of the powerful industrial headlights, the three thousand burning torches dimmed to little more than flickering fireflies.
Many of the bandits were dazzled so badly that they could barely keep their eyes open. They hastily raised their arms to shield themselves, and a considerable commotion rippled through the crowd.
Behind those blinding beams of light, a luxurious carriage shimmered with golden radiance, reflecting light in all directions as it slowly entered the encirclement.
The Chief fought through the pain in his eyes and stared at the carriage through the gaps between his fingers. Greedy saliva was practically dripping from his mouth.
He took a step forward and pushed his way out of the crowd.
With a forceful sweep of his enormous nine-ringed broadsword, he held it out before him. The rings clashed together with a crisp clatter.
Throwing out his chest, he let out an arrogant roar that reverberated through the gorge and shook the forest.
“Hey, you fat sheep up ahead! Get your asses down here and face your grandpa!”
