Xi Qingyue hadn’t expected to encounter bandits here, especially a group of over a hundred men. Were they targeting the merchant convoy specifically, or was this just a coincidence?
She had caught up with the merchants about half an hour ago, but on the stretch of road ahead, there were too many carts and refugees, making it impossible to move quickly. Thinking she still had over a dozen miles left before reaching Liang City, she decided to stop and rest for a while. These bandits really knew how to pick their timing.
Most of the bandits surrounded the merchant convoy, while another group moved toward those with carts—people they presumed to be wealthy targets.
At the first sign of the bandits, many scattered like startled birds. Children were scooped up by adults and carried away into the distance. The elderly, unable to run, simply sat down where they were, resigned.
“Damn it all! They’re not leaving us any way to survive!” an old man wept, pounding the ground in despair, his voice filled with hopelessness.
The cries of children filled the air as people fled in chaotic, disorderly disarray.
The bandit leader’s furious voice thundered over the crowd, “Nobody move! Stay where you are! Hand over your money, leave the women and children behind, and you might just walk away with your lives. Otherwise, none of you will make it out alive!”
At his words, many who had been sprinting came to a halt. The women and children turned pale with terror, their eyes wide with fear.
Xi Qingyue watched this scene and shook her head with a sigh. The number of refugees far outnumbered the bandits, yet most people’s first instinct was to flee. Some were even too frightened to move after the bandit’s threat. Only a handful had picked up knives and stood ready to defend their families.
On the mule cart, Xi Weilan quickly drew her pistol with her right hand, gripping Xi Qingyue’s clothes tightly with her left. She looked nervously at the bandits closing in.
Xi Qingyue felt a flicker of satisfaction at this. Being nervous was fine—she just couldn’t stand cowards who only knew how to cry. The child was still young; she’d been hunting before but never killed anyone. Compared to other kids her age, she was already impressive.
Xi Qingyue reached out and gently held Xi Weilan’s hand, guiding the pistol back into its holster. Then she reached into the cart, and in the next moment, she pulled out a submachine gun.
She handed it to Xi Weilan, her tone serious. “Lan’er, use this later. Be merciless with anyone who tries to snatch our cart or grab people. Remember, this isn’t murder—it’s defense. Kill one bad person to save countless good ones. Those who don’t fight back will only wait for death.”
Xi Weilan gripped the submachine gun tightly and nodded. “Mm, Big Sister, I understand.”
No sooner had she spoken than a dozen bandits surrounded their mule cart.
“Well, well, look here—two little girls. Perfect. Take them and the cart back with us. They look clean and cute—not bad at all.”
Xi Qingyue let out a cold laugh. “You sure talk big.”
“Hmph! Handling two little brats like you is effortless. You’d better behave and listen if you want to spare yourselves some pain.”
The moment the bandit finished speaking, Xi Qingyue moved.
Using her wind-element powers, she leaped into the air and flew straight toward them. Suspended at a height taller than the men, she spun three hundred and sixty degrees in the air, her long blade slicing through one neck after another. Lines of blood sprayed out like a crimson brush painting the sky.
With the blade as her brush, blood as her ink, and the ground as her canvas, she instantly turned the area around the cart into a dynamic, three-dimensional tableau of fallen men.
Everyone who saw this stared wide-eyed, while the bandits erupted in fury.
Before the battle had even fully begun, they had already lost over a dozen brothers—it was unbearable.
The bandit leader, still confronting the merchants up ahead, pointed furiously toward Xi Qingyue. “Unbelievable! Brothers, kill them! I’ll have them torn apart limb from limb!”
But as he shouted, he heard a sharp sound cutting through the air behind him. He lunged forward just in time to dodge an arrow flying over his head.
Turning back, he saw a man holding a bow standing by a carriage in the middle of the merchant convoy, already nocking a second arrow.
The group that had been subdued under their siege moments ago suddenly came alive like a shot of adrenaline. They raised their weapons and began fighting hand-to-hand with the bandits.
Xi Qingyue charged forward with her blade, cutting down every bandit in her path with a single, fatal strike. Her movements were incredibly fast, and she showed no mercy.
The bandit leader, filled with rage, rode his horse straight toward her.
At the same time, over a dozen bandits circled around to the other side of Xi Weilan’s cart. They wanted to capture her first to avenge their fallen comrades, then deal with Xi Qingyue brutally.
The woman in plain clothes and Luo Ling, who had just arrived using light-footed kung fu, quickly drew their blades to help. But before they could move, Xi Weilan became furious.
Her small face stern, she raised the submachine gun and aimed it at the bandits. “You bad guys! Don’t you dare steal children!”
She pulled the trigger and fired a burst. The dozen bandits were riddled with bullets and collapsed instantly, their blood pooling on the ground.
The woman in plain clothes and the others were dumbstruck. A nearby man who had come with an axe stood frozen, his mouth agape in shock.
For a moment, it was as if time stood still around the cart—deathly silent—until the bandit leader’s roar rang out from ahead, “You little brat! Prepare to die!”
Everyone looked up to see the bandit leader charging at Xi Qingyue on horseback, raising his broadsword high to strike her down from above.
Just as the blade came down, Xi Qingyue’s small figure leaped upward, her own knife meeting his. Her steel blade sliced through his like a knife through a melon, the severed pieces clattering to the ground. The man’s hands went numb with shock, his eyes wide with disbelief.
In that instant, Xi Qingyue soared above him, gripping her knife with both hands, and brought it down in a single, devastating slash from above his head. Blood sprayed everywhere.
“Big Brother…”
The bandits still fighting the merchants saw their leader split in two and immediately howled in fury, their eyes bloodshot.
Distracted, they fell victim to ambushes from the merchants, the bold refugees wielding whatever weapons they had, and the timely aid of Luo Ling and the guards. Within moments, every last bandit was wiped out.
Staring at the hundred-odd bodies scattered across the ground, the refugees who had been waiting for death could hardly believe their eyes.
The merchants felt a wave of relief wash over them. They had been certain their losses would be devastating, yet the tide had turned so dramatically.
All eyes turned toward the mule cart. Everyone knew the person they owed the most gratitude was Xi Qingyue.
She was a ruthless one, but she was also the one who had saved their lives.
Xi Qingyue walked calmly back to the cart. Xi Weilan was still standing there, clutching the submachine gun. The woman in plain clothes stood beside the cart.
Xi Qingyue smiled and nodded at her, then approached Xi Weilan, her tone gentle. “Lan’er, go rest in the cart for a bit.”
“Okay, Big Sister.”
Once Xi Weilan climbed into the cart, Xi Qingyue immediately sent her to the dimensional space.
She then turned to the woman in plain clothes and bowed sincerely. “Thank you for watching over my sister.”
The woman didn’t take up this line of conversation. Instead, she spoke gravely, “Your younger sister is still so young. With the chaos like this, aren’t you afraid something will happen to her, leaving her alone by the carriage?”
Xi Qingyue shook her head lightly. “No, I’m not afraid. She’s my sister, so naturally I won’t let anything happen to her.”
The woman frowned, confused. “But letting a three-year-old child kill people—aren’t you afraid she’ll be frightened and develop a shadow over her heart?”
She remembered that back in the deep mountains, Xi Weilan had felt guilty even for accidentally injuring her—let alone killing so many people.
Xi Qingyue glanced at her and spoke slowly, “No one is born knowing how to kill. I can make sure she eats well, dresses well, lives well, and never suffers hardship. But I won’t truly let her grow up into a useless person, especially in times like these.”
She then pointed at the crowd of refugees and looked at the woman in plain clothes. “Look how many children there are among these people. If I hadn’t acted just now, and you hadn’t arrived in time, the merchants would have been too busy trying to save themselves. How many people do you think would have died here? How many children would have become food for others? I don’t want my little sister to become a lamb waiting for slaughter.”
